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IMPACT

Practus delivers actionable solutions with tangible impact to its clients

PE Fund

Interim Management

US headquartered fund with a portfolio of over $350bn across the world and US$6bn investments in India appointed Practus as the Interim Controller for its India office, reporting to the HK Regional Office

  1. Staffed Controller within 3 weeks of receiving request
  2. Achieved 100% compliance with internal and external reporting requirements and 92% compliance with other KPIs agreed with Fund CEO

Services

Post Merger Integration and Automation

Swiss headquartered, PE invested, global leader in visa processing services needed help in Post Merger Integration for its acquisitions in Ukraine, Russia, UK, Dubai, Abu Dhabi and India

  1. Practus project managed the Post Merger Integration for each of the cross border acquisitions
  2. On an average cashflow and management reporting were fully integrated on an automated basis with the parent company within 50 days of the acquisition
  3. Practus played a key role in delivering the target ~US$8mn in synergies from the mergers

Edible Fats

Interim Management and Performance Management

Fortune 1000 Swedish-Danish global leader of high-value added vegetable oils and fats, with a presence in 13 countries brought in Practus in an Interim CFO role. The company faced challenges in integration of its newly acquired India subsidiary on account of differences in cultures, separation of KMP in Finance and lack of a proper handover

  1. Put in place 4 man senior Finance team including CFO within 2 weeks of request from the client
  2. Implemented commodity risk management tools to manage an exposure of ~US$125mn within 30 days of engagement commencement Streamlined Forex hedging processes to save ~ US$3mn in hedging costs

Pharma

Post Merger Integration and Performance Management

Fortune 1000 German-Kiwi Joint Venture and a global leader in excipient solutions brought in Practus to manage the Post Merger acquisition as their India CFO

  1. Resolved legacy issues in accounting and compliance, to bring it in line with IFRS within 4 months
  2. Reduced monthly reporting time from 8 weeks to 1 week, within 3 months
  3. Go-Live of SAP within 6 months
  4. Achieved savings of ~US$2.5mn through renegotiation of vendor contracts

Infrastructure

Turnaround and Restructuring Management

US major PE invested stressed infrastructure company with~US$175mn revenue and ~US$250mn borrowings needed help with restructuring and turning around its highways business

  1. Successfully delinked highways SPV from issues faced by the larger group within 6 months
  2. Engaged with a consortium of 6 private and government owned banks to restructure loans, providing immediate cash flow relief to the company to the tune of ~US$22mn
  3. Divested loss making assets and recovered overdue milestone linked payments from government owned firms adding a further ~US$8million to the cashflow

Staffing

Performance Improvement

Global leader in cruise liner business needed help with validating a business case for a shared service centre and transition of finance processes from the UK to India

  1. Created visual SOPs to help manage transition in processes
  2. Created business case demonstrating 13 months payback on transition investment, within 4 months of mandate commencement
  3. Established and stabilized operations at shared services within 5 months of approval
  4. Delivered ~US$7mn in salary and rental savings

Industrials

Finance Transformation and Performance Improvement

US$150mn industrial Fragrances and flavors leader, with manufacturing facilities in India and Europe, in the midst of a family dispute, needed help with professional management of its finance function

  1. Over a 5 year period, Practus played a variety of roles including involvement in sale of a non-core asset, family settlement, debt and equity fund raise, SAP implementation and eventually assisted in an IPO, resulting in enterprise valuations increasing from US$50mn to US$750mn in 5 years

IT Solutions

Turnaround & Restructuring Management & Performance Improvement

PE invested UK based start-up, multi country provider of innovative IT solution including real time financial data, news and algorithmic decision tools to brokerages, financial Institutions, fund managers

  1. Reduced MIS reporting time from 60 days to 8 days
  2. Achieved savings of ~ US$200,000 through vendor negotiations
  3. Led innovative restructuring of shareholding of Promoters and Series A VC investors which improved valuations to the tune of 12%, while mitigating potential tax exposures to the tune of ~US$2mn

Retail

Performance Improvement

Promoter owned and managed supermarket chain with Revenue of ~US$150mn 27 retail and 2 C&C stores in Abu Dhabi, Sharjah & Dubai employing 1,000+ employees

  1. Reduced inventory shrinkage from 2% of sales to ~ 0.5%, saving ~US$3mn
  2. Delivered 100% compliance with month end MIS and presentation to Advisory Board, for each of the 24 months since inception of the mandate

ATM

Performance Improvement

Global leader, Australian supplier of ATM and POS Machines formed a JV with leading PE fund and scaled up ~500 ATMs to 3,000 ATMs in 12 months

  1. Improved measurement and collection processes to reduce DSO by 32% freeing up ~US$ 5mn in cash flow and ~US$ 0.5mn in interest cost

Consumer Goods

Finance Transformation and Automation

Fortune 500 French headquartered MNC and global leader in nutrition and water needed help with moving from yearly budget model to a rolling forecast model. Practus was tasked with developing an automated tool at an SKU level allowing for multiple iterations, increase frequency of reporting and lesser need for interaction between business and finance teams

Estimated Time Saving of the F&A Team and the CFO w.r.t the activity of forecasting

Resources Involved Before Practus’s Model (days per month) After Practus’s Model (days per month)
CFO 2 0.75
FP&A Team 9 3.5

Services

Post-Merger Integration and Performance Improvement

Fortune 500, leading risk management, insurance broking and human resources consulting firm based out of USA sold its payroll processing businesses in Singapore, China and India to a PE fund

  1. Tightly managed contract novations and transition of customer collections from legacy bank accounts to new bank accounts, saved over ~US$3mn in cash investments for the new owners
  2. Delivered $4mn in tax savings through structuring of goodwill arising on acquisition

Auto Components

Automation and Performance Improvement

$200mn, PE invested, family run Tier I auto component company with businesses in India, Europe, USA and Brazil needed Practus to automate its compliance, reporting and material planning requirements

  1. Implemented ‘light’ IT solutions on top of JD Edwards, with implementation time of less than 3 weeks each, reducing time on reporting and compliance by 32% with annual savings of ~US$400K in salaries, reducing raw material inventory to the tune of ~US$ 5mn

BFSI

Automation and Performance Improvement

Merchant lending Non-Banking Finance Company, an investee of an award winning Fund with over ~US$200mn in loans, required assistance in improving sales effectiveness and customer retention

  1. Practus re-defined data collation processes around the marketing and sales functions, implemented a revised variable remuneration policy, implemented a CRM and a robust weekly review mechanism, which improved average revenue realisation per sales person by 32% in 6 months, delivering an incremental annual revenue of ~US$4mn

Social Impact Fund

Automation and Performance Improvement

US headquartered Social Impact fund with ~US$1.3bn corpus making grants and investments in social enterprises in education, health, water and sanitation. Operating in 8 countries, the fund needed assistance with implementing an IT tool to monitor operating levers and financial performance of its 49 investees

  1. Practus implemented a globally acclaimed IT tool to track Budget and Actual operating and financial information for 5 investees, within 3 months, resulting in annual time savings of ~US$ 1.3mn in Fund employees’ salaries
  2. On average, monthly reviews between the Fund and investees were advanced by 6.5 days

Services

Finance Transformation

US$4bn listed, global manufacturer of industrial steel valves with 15 manufacturing plants globally needed help with implementing a product costing system in Baan Infor

  1. Implemented a target costing system, based on standard cost, within 5 months
  2. Drove cost savings of ~US$ 8mn through tighter controls over material mix, machine and labour efficiency