Magnitude SourceConnect for SAP® Central Finance

Third Party Data Solutions for SAP Central Finance

The power of SAP S/4HANA Central Finance is that it aggregates all financial transactions into a central system for advanced reporting, scalability and ultimately transformation of the finance function. This is a major strategic advantage for companies who adopt the system, however, to realize these benefits, data from multiple source systems must be effectively and efficiently interfaced with Central Finance – which is where Magnitude SourceConnect for SAP can help.

Magnitude SourceConnect for SAP is a suite of applications that enables the fastest, lowest cost and lowest risk integration of 3rd party data into Central Finance by streamlining key aspects of the data integration process. Magnitude SourceConnect for SAP is co-innovated with SAP as a complementary solution to Central Finance, and is in four parts:

Magnitude SourceConnect Transaction  allows rapid connection to any source system, whether through a direct connection or through flat file import.

  • Pre-built source connectors are available for an expanding library of systems, covering key vendors including Oracle, Microsoft, Infor and many others.
  • Additional source connectors can be developed on demand in as little as 4-6 weeks each, and new sources can typically be brought on-line in 2-3 weeks each.
  • Data connection via flat file is available to cover any source where a direct connector is not available, or where access to source ERP is not available.

Each source connector supports up to 23 transaction types (depending on the source system) which are extracted from the source, mapped into the required format for Central Finance, and loaded into the Universal Journal via the SAP-recommended SLT interface.

Magnitude SourceConnect SyncBack enables clearing of customer and vendor invoices in source ERPs as payments are executed in Central Finance. This capability supports what many view as the ultimate goal of Central Finance, which is to become a central shared services platform. In this case, Central Finance provides not only central visibility, but also allows management actions such as allowing payment processing, Cash Applications and AP Payments to be performed in Central Finance instead of source ERPs. This in turn requires that incoming and outgoing payment transactions are written back to source ERPs, associated with the original invoice and balance is cleared out. In this way, the source systems are kept in sync with Central Finance.

Magnitude SourceConnect Drilldown stores source system transaction details directly in HANA to allow seamless drill down from summary journal entries in Central Finance. Even though the key financial information is loaded to the Central Finance Universal Journal, there is often a need to refer to the original complete transaction details for confirmation or reconciliation. In this case, a Drilldown capability allows for quick research and additional reporting. Loading transaction detail information into HANA allows for fast and seamless access to the data while avoiding the need for training end users in the use of multiple systems.

  • View original transaction detail for non-SAP sources, right within the Fiori applications
  • Enable complementary reporting on non-financial data (or combination of financial and non-financial data)
  • Maintain persistent transaction history even when source systems are not available

Magnitude SourceConnect Harmonization quickly handles many of the issues of master data consistency across diverse sources, including SAP sources. It is a fact of life that there will be inconsistency in master data across multiple systems, and unless this is resolved, subsequent analysis in Central Finance will be suspect at best. SourceConnect Harmonization identifies and builds a master data mapping to connect and standardize disparate data from all sources. Harmonization is therefore a crucial step in enabling Central Finance.

  • Extract, review and match key master data (customer, supplier, material/item, GL account) across all connected systems (including SAP sources). Similar items are automatically matched and merged to build a complete master record, subject to human checking, as required. Based on these matches, the Business Mappings (complete master records as well as cross-system key value mappings) are created and loaded in Central Finance to bridge the data differences between systems, ad enable proper transaction posting.
  • Chart of Accounts parent-child hierarchies are loaded from source systems and loaded into a hierarchy browser, so GL account codes may be properly matched and reflected in Central Finance.
  • Project planning dashboard automatically analyzes key data from each source and creates metrics to plan implementation based on measured data consistency and data quality in source systems.
  • SourceConnect Harmonization quickly creates master data mappings, but it is not a full-featured MDM system. Rather it is complementary to MDM and can be used as a starting point for a more comprehensive and long term master data management initiative, using SAP Master Data Governance or another MDM solution.

Time, cost and risk  without Magnitude SourceConnect for SAP, companies may be tempted to develop their own data integration and harmonization capabilities, but in most circumstances, this would be a mistake for a number of reasons:

  • Intimate knowledge of every source system is required, including both data structures (how the data is stored) and data standards (how to interpret the data), and how to apply change data capture to each
  • Intimate knowledge of the many transformations required to correctly interpret, map and load financial documents and master data into Central Finance, including very many document types, tax document handling, balance migration, as well as performance optimization to manage high transaction volumes, to name only a few examples.
  • Intimate knowledge of SAP Central Finance data requirements, restrictions and methods to extend the Central Finance data structures
  • Very few people have the broad skill required to manage the above for both initial development and ongoing maintenance. If these people can be found, what are the chances they will be available to be dedicated to this project on a long term basis?

Each individual integration requirement contains inherent complexity, but taken together, the difficulty of integrating third party data sources into SAP Central Finance is considerable and makes most home-grown integration efforts impractical and risky.

Magnitude SourceConnect for SAP offers pre-built solutions to connect and harmonize multiple source systems for the fastest, lowest cost, and lowest risk implementations of SAP S/4HANA Central Finance.

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Chris Ney

Chairman and
Chief Executive Officer

Chris oversees Magnitude Software’s overall corporate vision and strategic direction.

As Chairman and CEO, Chris leads Magnitude Software’s corporate vision and strategic direction, driving the company’s acquisition, integration and growth strategies to extend the company’s global reach. Under his leadership, Magnitude Software has developed an unparalleled customer experience, strengthened its culture of innovation, and greatly increased profitability and shareholder value. In September 2014, Chris successfully secured up to $100 million in capital to further build Magnitude Software through product innovation, organic growth and strategic acquisitions.

Ney was previously Co-Founder and President of Silverback Enterprise Group, where the team completed the strategic acquisition of nine industry-leading enterprise software companies and leveraged their synergies to build two powerful new entities: Magnitude Software and Upland Software. Magnitude Software offers a family of award-winning solutions for enterprise performance management, master data management and data connectivity. Upland Software (Nasdaq: UPLD) went public in late 2014 and is a leading provider of cloud-based enterprise work management software with over 2,000 active enterprise customers and more than 235,000 active users in more than 50 countries.

Prior to co-founding Silverback, Ney was CEO of a series of Trilogy/Versata portfolio software companies. He previously served as Chairman of the Board, CEO and Founder of CoreTrac, a financial services CRM software company. Ney began his career working for investment banking firms Lehman Brothers and UBS.

He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from Texas A&M University.

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Rik Thorbecke

Chief Financial Officer

Rik oversees finance strategy and operations, risk management, legal, IT and sales operations.

As CFO, Rik leads a team focuses on effective business partnerships that drive continuous improvement in business process and technologies. He is an experienced CFO, COO, and Advisory Board Member with broad, global leadership experience in the software, SaaS, internet, cloud, telecommunications, and electronic manufacturing industries. Rik is skilled in strategic finance, mergers and acquisitions, IPO readiness, business planning, investor relations, enterprise software, entrepreneurship, and international business. He is a strong business development and customer-oriented executive.

Rik spent 25 years in various executive finance and strategy roles at a number of well-known public and high-growth private companies, including Electronic Arts, Equinix, and Levi Strauss; he was also CFO of Plastic Logic, Meltwater and Mirantis. He started his career at PwC where he became a partner in the global technology practice based in the Amsterdam office. In 1999 he moved to the San Jose, California office where he served as partner in the Software and Internet practice. Following the path of many expatriates he, his wife and three children decided to call the San Francisco Bay Area their home ever since.

Rik holds a Double Bachelor’s of Science Degree in Marketing and Economics, a Master’s of Science Degree in Business Administration and a Post Graduate Degree in Accounting and Auditing from the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Rik is also an active California CPA.

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Kevin Mischnick

Senior Vice President,
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Kevin oversees global financial operations for Magnitude Software.

Bringing more than 25 years of financial experience to Magnitude Software, Kevin is responsible for a number of areas of the business, including Finance, Accounting, Legal and Information Technology.

Kevin’s background includes building and transforming financial teams into high-performing units, implementing systems and processes focused on cost savings and efficiency, and raising nearly $100 million in investor capital. He served as Senior Vice President of Finance for Multimedia Games Inc. and Capstar Broadcasting Corporation. Under his financial leadership, the market values of both companies increased more than tenfold.

Kevin is a certified public accountant and holds a Bachelor of Business Administration in Accounting from Texas Tech University.

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Laurie Dahlgren

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Laurie oversees HR strategy, talent acquisition, employee engagement and organizational development.

As Magnitude Software’s global people operations leader, Laurie drives initiatives that empower an engaged, high-performing workforce, in alignment with business goals and in support of rapid business growth.

Laurie brings extensive leadership experience across multiple industries and companies at different stages and sizes, including working with employees in 30 countries across 70+ locations. Prior to joining Magnitude, Laurie served as Vice President of People at Mirantis, a leader in open cloud infrastructure. Previously, she was Vice President of Human Resources at Meltwater, a global SaaS company engaged in media intelligence. She held leadership roles with several Silicon Valley venture-backed, technology companies before relocating to Austin, TX in 2017.

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Bill Stephens

General Manager, Magnitude Applications

Bill leads the Magnitude Applications business, driving strategic direction, product and service execution, revenue growth and customer engagement. His expertise within the commercial and public sectors – from Fortune 100 to SMBs – enables Bill and his team to consistently enable customers to extract the right value from their ERP systems working with their own tools and business processes and with third-party technologies.

A seasoned IT and consulting executive with a 20-year track record leading teams to drive customer success across diverse industries, Bill previously served as BIAS’ Vice President of Services overseeing the successful delivery of solutions across the Public Sector and Commercial markets. Prior to BIAS, Bill served for over a decade at Oracle Corporation as an applications consultant, project manager, senior operations director, and consulting executive.

He developed the foundation of his leadership skills while serving as a Cavalry Scout in the Kentucky Army National Guard.

Bill holds a Bachelor of Science in Finance from the University of Louisville.

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Tony Fisher

General Manager, Magnitude Integration

Tony leads the Magnitude Integration business, driving strategy, revenue, product and operations as well as leveraging and integrating our Simba- and Innowera- based technologies for new Magnitude solutions.

An accomplished data management and big data marketplace leader, Tony previously served as the SVP, Business Development & Strategy at Zaloni, an award-winning enterprise data lakes management provider; prior to that role, he was Vice President, Data Collaboration & Integration at Progress Software, where he led the business line’s strategic direction and operations.

Prior to Progress, Tony was the CEO of Dataflux Corporation. He also served as Director of data warehouse technology at SAS. A key technology leader at SAS, Tony provided the engineering research and development direction that helped make SAS the market leader in data warehouse software sales.

Tony earned a Degree in Computer Science and Mathematics from Duke University.

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Darren Peirce

Chief Technology Officer

Darren spearheads the development, execution and management of strategic opportunities and key customer accounts across our portfolio.

As Magnitude’s technology guru and evangelist, Darren is critical to building on our position as a leading provider of software and services that help organizations tackle the challenges and opportunities inherent in digital information management.

Previously, Darren served as CTO and Group Vice President of Product Management at Kalido; prior to that role, he was the Lead Solutions Architect and Manager of Professional Services in the United Kingdom. He also worked in senior consulting positions for companies such as Royal Dutch Shell and British Telecom.

Darren received a degree in Management from Intec College in Cape Town, ,South Africa, and studied Economics at the University of Stellenbosch.

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Mihir Shah

Executive Vice President,
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Mihir is responsible for Magnitude Software’s acquisition and organic strategy.

Mihir has over a decade of experience leading acquisitions and strategy. During this period, he led several public and private company acquisitions, divestitures, and minority and majority equity investments.

Previously, Mihir was M&A Executive for IBM’s Information Management Software division, executing IBM’s inorganic strategy through M&A and strategic partnerships. He also served as Operating Executive for private equity firm, Golden Gate Capital, and as Vice President for Corporate Development at Aspect Software.

Mihir holds an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and Master of Science from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

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Karen McPhillips

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The mind that opens to a new idea never returns to its original state

Karen McPhillips drives marketing strategy and operational execution to grow the company profile, revenue and market position.

Leveraging 20+ years of transformational marketing experience, Karen fuels Magnitude’s corporate and existing portfolio marketing, collaborating to maximize the company’s business strategy while also supporting integration of acquired products and services.

Karen has served on leadership teams of public and private companies of all sizes, transforming marketing functions and generating both tangible and intangible value. Most recently at PlumChoice, she and her team repositioned the brand and metamorphosed the marketing function in support of the company’s pivot from IT support provider to leader in the cloud services and Internet of Things spaces. At Iron Mountain and its technology arm, Iron Mountain Digital, she created new marketing functions, introduced the marketing operations discipline, and spearheaded a closed-loop leads-to-revenue framework coupled with a brand-to-demand communication platform that raised the bar on marketing’s revenue influence. Prior to Iron Mountain, Karen held marketing leadership roles with SaaS back-up leader, Connected Corporation (acquired by Iron Mountain), and SilverStream Software, contributing to the company’s IPO and acquisition by Novell.

Karen earned a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism from St. Michael’s College in Vermont.