Canelco is a Finnish industrial conglomerate formed by the merger of several regional private equity funds. The Canelco Group consists of the parent company Canelco Oy and two subsidiaries (sub-groups). The group also includes two associated companies. The parent company, Canelco Ltd, plays a key role in the strategic development of the subsidiaries or associated companies it owns.

The Canelco Group employs nearly 700 people in Finland and in 2023, its impact turnover was over EUR 200 million.

To harmonise and streamline the Group's reporting, budgeting and forecasting processes

At its peak in 2010, Canelco had almost thirty portfolio companies operating simultaneously. The companies provided financial data in a wide variety of formats, and it was a time-consuming manual task to process the data into a consistent monitoring and reporting format.

In 2019, Canelco changed its strategy and started to make majority investments, and the Canelco Group was born. This change brought with it consolidated financial reporting requirements and the natural need to harmonise and streamline reporting, budgeting, forecasting and consolidation at all levels of the organisation, including the parent company, subsidiaries, associates and sub-groups.

Canelco's ownership is an active and daily activity, so it was essential to choose software that would also be suitable for subsidiaries, associates and sub-groups. When evaluating the different software options, Canelco paid particular attention to ease of use and an interactive interface that allows users to build their own key figures and reports. In addition, the software had to offer a wide range of functionalities for profit and loss budgeting, balance sheet budgeting and forecasting for both individual companies and the group, and should not be dependent on a specific accounting software.

For Canelco as a group, it was also important that the chosen software included comprehensive consolidation functionality, accounting functionality for minority and associated companies and integration.

Comprehensive deployment training and the ease of use and self-service model of the Finadeck software enabled a smooth implementation

Before implementing Finadeck, Canelco tried another software for the same purpose, but the experience of using that software was difficult and rigid. In 2022, Finadeck approached Canelco and during the bidding phase, Canelco particularly appreciated Finadeck's clear pricing and implementation process. In addition, Canelco welcomed Finadeck's commitment to incorporate the functionality that is important to Canelco into the software during the development path. These functionalities have been developed on a scalable basis, free of charge after deployment.

In the photo from left to right: Canelco partner Pekka Hietala, Canelco's CFO Sari Pietiläinen, Finadeck's CEO Saku Pöllänen and Canelco's Accounting Manager Maria Litmanen

"Confidence in Finadeck's team and support was built from the very first project, with deadlines met and manuals delivered on time"

At Canelco, the implementation of Finadeck was carried out in phases, starting with a pilot phase in one subsidiary. After a successful pilot, the roll-out was extended to all subsidiaries, associates and subgroups. This allowed for extensive automation of reporting, budgeting, forecasting and consolidation within the main group. Sari Pietiläinen, Finance Manager at Canelco, emphasises that the confidence in Finadeck's team and support was strengthened during the first project, when schedules and manuals were managed as agreed.

The implementation of Finadeck was smooth and in the first phase, the subsidiaries' and associates' actual data was integrated into Finadeck using the ready-made Netvisor and Visma.net integrations. Budgets and forecasts were imported for each company via the Onedrive integration, fixed assets and loan lists via Excel import files and investments were directly entered into Finadeck. Canelco also benefited from the convenience of Finadeck to generate budgets and forecasts for the whole group from the budgets of subsidiaries and associates.

During the first phase of the implementation in Finadeck, the group accounting rules were defined with Maria Litmase, Accounting Manager, to eliminate intra-group transactions. Finadeck also took into account the history of the group structure, ownership history and ownership percentages, calculating the impact of minority and associated companies on the main group. Other eliminations, such as group accounts, were brought to Finadeck by Canelco through Onedrive, the elimination company set up by Finadeck, which allowed all eliminations to be taken into account in the group.

Finadeck's support team, together with Canelco staff, also built the KPIs and reporting templates defined by Canelco in the first implementation phase. After the reports were built, automatic email delivery of the reports was switched on, which allowed for automated reporting. Maria Litmanen, Accounting Manager at Canelco, and Sari Pietiläinen, Finance Manager at Finadeck, report significant time savings in the monthly compilation of consolidated figures, also taking into account the time-saving benefits Finadeck brings to the Canelco Group subsidiaries and sub-groups.

In the picture from left to right Finadeck's CEO Saku Pöllänen, Canelco's CFO Sari Pietiläinen, Canelco's Accounting Manager Maria Litmanen and Canelco's Partner Pekka Hietala

At a later stage of implementation, Finadeck has defined with each subsidiary, associate and sub-group the drivers with which the budget is to be entered into Finadeck. During the implementation training, most of the subsidiaries and associates have been able to skip the Excel spreadsheets altogether and enter the profit and loss budget with the desired parameters and calculation levels directly in Finadeck. In addition, Finadeck's support has built detailed manuals for each company, making budgeting and forecasting easier even after the actual implementation training.

The elimination of Excel-based spreadsheets has improved the quality of reporting and planning in subsidiaries and associates, while reducing the possibility of manual errors. In addition, Finadeck has reviewed key performance indicators with each company and identified reporting needs to automate internal reporting within the companies and streamline the budgeting and forecasting process.

"Finadeck's strength lies in its ability to seamlessly integrate diverse data from different business units, enabling consolidated reporting"

The clarity and consistency of the Finadeck user interface across the organisation has been a major advantage for Canelco. This enables the group management to support subsidiaries and associates in financial management, such as generating key figures and reports, creating budget drivers, budgeting, scenario and forecasting, managing fixed assets and loan information, planning investments and setting elimination rules. "Finadeck's strength lies in its ability to seamlessly integrate diverse data from different business units, enabling consolidated reporting. The consolidation process is now efficient and real-time, giving the group's management an accurate overview of all business units." Maria Litmanen, Accounting Manager at Canelco sums up.

Canelco is also pleased with the smooth implementation of Finadeck, and says that the customer service and development team have been excellent, even exceeding expectations in terms of response and reaction times. Sari Pietiläinen, Finance Manager at Canelco, Maria Litmanen, Accounting Manager, and Pekka Hietala, Partner, point out that Canelco has been able to discuss with Finadeck in an open manner the development needs that have been raised, which Finadeck has taken into account in a reasonable timeframe in its development work. Canelco also appreciates Finadeck's scalable approach, which has allowed other customers to benefit from the desired functionality at no extra cost.

Finadeck is not just a software solution, but a strategic partner

The partnership between Canelco and Finadeck has been a strong alliance that has shaped the group's financial management into an efficient and successful one. Finadeck is not just a software solution, but a strategic partner that supports the Group in its financial challenges and opportunities. With Finadeck's launch of the consolidated financial statements functionality in spring 2024, Canelco will in future also automate the preparation of the consolidated financial statements with Finadeck. Canelco's CFO Sari Pietiläinen, Accounting Manager Maria Litmanen and Partner Pekka Hietala are happy to recommend Finadeck to other companies and the group.