Colson Assoc.

Colson Associates manages an international association of manufacturing and service companies, the largest being the Colson Group, Inc. and its affiliates. It also serves the Am-Safe/Bridport companies, world leaders in the manufacture of aircraft passenger seat belts and other restraints, and specialty medical products manufacturers including, Acumed, MicroAire, OsteoMed and Precision Edge. Its companies operate on five continents in 16 different countries.

Financial Compliance Management

Problem
Colson Associates used a FoxPro based consolidation and reporting system to generate monthly and yearly financial reports. Collecting the results for approximately 46 operating companies, 13 “elimination” companies, and 19 consolidated entities, over 6 levels of consolidation was a very labor intensive and timely process. As these companies operate in 13 different local currencies and the reporting had to be in the local currency with conversion to US$ under FAS 51, consistent application of exchange rates was critical. Some reported had to be completed within as little as 3 business days of month end showing the month’s sales and net income. Missing reporting dates left managers without important operational information and potentially missing mandated government reporting deadlines.

Solution
The Savvion BusinessManager system now manages the reporting process. Information collection workflow is managed by an interrelated set of process flows that prompt staff for operational and financial information on a predefined schedule. As due dates near managers are alerted to potential delays and problems are resolved before they become critical. The process also assists the participants by collecting and delivering exchange rate data to suppor their efforts. On an annual basis the system also assists with the collection and disposition of the annual bugeting process. Multiple levels of security and access controls are provided to assure only authorized staff members have visibility to the process and process financial data.