Multi Entity Financial Reporting

Industry: Horticulture, landscaping and grounds maintenance
Organisation: Australian group of five operating businesses
Solution type: Data platform, financial consolidation and business intelligence
Core technology: Azure Data Lake, Logic Apps, Azure Functions, Azure SQL, Power BI
Engagement: Consulting, data engineering, dashboard and portal development

Headline resultGroup reporting moved from months after close to nightly, near real time insight

Overview

A national group made up of five separate operating businesses had no single view of its financial performance. Using our Microsoft Azure consulting services, we built a cloud data platform that pulls data from every accounting and sales system each night, standardises it and delivers consolidated Power BI reporting to executives, finance and sales teams.

The Business Problem

Each business ran its own systems, including several MYOB Exo instances, Xero, custom invoicing tools and spreadsheets for budgets and targets. Charts of accounts and reporting structures differed, so consolidation was manual and inconsistent. Group results only arrived around three months after period end, via external accountants.

No unified modelNo unified financial model across entities
Mixed reporting structuresDifferent charts of accounts and reporting structures
Inconsistent numbersSpreadsheet consolidation that produced inconsistent numbers
No budget comparisonNo way to compare budgets with actual results

Our Solution

We designed an Azure analytics platform around four goals: consolidation, standardisation, timely data and efficiency. Azure Logic Apps collect data nightly from each source and load it into Azure Data Lake. Azure Functions then map every chart of accounts to a common structure, balance entity balance sheets and normalise customer and sales records.

Aggregated reporting models in Azure SQL Database feed Power BI semantic models and dashboards. We loaded around seven years of history for trend analysis and built a secure portal where finance staff upload budgets, sales targets and KPI ranges for automated variance reporting.

Logic Apps collect data each night
Data lands in Azure Data Lake
Functions standardise every record
Azure SQL holds the reporting models
Power BI shows group results

Multi-entity financial reporting with Power BI and Azure

Key Features

Nightly automated data refresh from all source systems
Entity level and group level views
Profit and loss and balance sheet reporting
Sales reporting by representative, customer and entity
Budget versus actual and variance analysis
Customer purchasing trend analysis
Traffic light KPI monitoring
Secure portal for budget and target uploads
Desktop and Power BI mobile app access

Outcomes

Leaders see consolidated results the morning after, instead of waiting months
One trusted set of numbers across all five businesses
Budgets and targets tracked against actuals automatically
Sales teams gained visibility of customer and representative performance
Finance staff spend less time building spreadsheets and more time on analysis

Technology Stack

Storage1 technology

Azure Data Lake

Ingestion1 technology

Azure Logic Apps

Transformation1 technology

Azure Functions

Reporting database1 technology

Azure SQL Database

Business intelligence1 technology

Power BI

Security1 technology

Microsoft Entra ID

Integrations5 technologies

MYOB Exo

Xero

Custom Invoicing Systems

REST APIs

Spreadsheet Uploads

Who This Solution Suits

This approach suits holding companies, franchise groups and businesses that have grown through acquisition and now run different accounting systems in each entity. It is relevant wherever leadership needs a consolidated, trusted view of performance.