How Contiweb modernized its Finance Reporting

The solid idea

Contiweb is an international supplier of advanced machines and solutions for the printing and packaging industry. The company helps its customers make production processes more efficient, reliable, and sustainable through innovative technology and services.

Within finance, the same question had been asked for some time: how can we automate our reporting?

Previously, reports were manually compiled in Excel during the month-end close. This required the finance team to spend significant time extracting and structuring data from multiple systems, leaving less room for analysis and interpretation.

This approach also increased the risk of errors and meant that reports were only available once a month. The business had to wait until closing and Excel updates to gain insight into performance.

CFO Bart van den Reek saw that this was a structural barrier to reliable decision-making. He therefore initiated an investment in a solid data platform. Under the leadership of Chloe Roizot, Finance Manager, the initiative was rolled out and shaped within Contiweb.

The take-off

Together with Rockfeather, Contiweb organized a workshop to map out processes and reporting needs. Based on this, the decision was made to implement Power BI and TimeXtender.

• Power BI was chosen for visualization and analysis, enabling employees to gain quick and easy insights into business performance.
• TimeXtender was used to automate data processing and preparation. It extracts data from different systems, combines it, and prepares it for analysis in a reliable data model—replacing the time-consuming and error-prone manual work previously done in Excel.
• For presenting figures in Power BI, Zebra BI visuals were used, based on the IBCS (International Business Communication Standards) framework. This ensures consistent and recognizable charts and tables, making variances immediately visible and reports easier to interpret.

Rockfeather led the implementation of the systems and the development of the first dashboards. Contiweb defined the business requirements: which information was needed and from which data sources.

The collaboration was structured around regular kick-offs and bi-weekly on-site working sessions. Rockfeather presented drafts, after which the teams refined the design and reconciled the data together. This step proved time-consuming but was essential for reliable reporting.

Alongside the technical implementation, Rockfeather invested in knowledge transfer. Contiweb staff received training in both Power BI and TimeXtender. The combination of training and hands-on experience quickly built the necessary expertise within the team.

The flight

The project encountered several challenges along the way, which were addressed step by step.

Creating the data pipelines, adding logic, and do the validation, turned out to take more time than initially expected. However, this process proved highly valuable: by thoroughly understanding and validating the data, the reliability of reporting improved significantly.

As the set up of the data platform (including the data pipelines, adding business logic, and data validation) took longer than expected, dashboard development started too early while the datasets were not yet ready. In hindsight, this approach proved to be inefficient and less effective. Once the data platform was on a certain level, dashboard developments could continue smoothly, and the subsequent data reconciliation further strengthened the reliability of the reporting.

The end result fully aligns with Contiweb’s ambition:

• Dashboards are automated and updated daily
• Reports are more reliable and directly accessible to the business
• The risk of errors has been greatly reduced
• Finance can now focus more on analysis and advice instead of manual data collection
• With Zebra BI embedded in Power BI, reports are consistently structured according to the IBCS standard, making variances immediately visible and insights easier to understand across the organization

According to Chloe Roizot, Finance Manager at Contiweb, collaboration with Rockfeather was crucial:

“Working with Rockfeather went well, especially during the challenging phases. They were flexible and went the extra mile when needed. We now have a solid foundation we can build on ourselves. For us, this is an important step toward data-driven working.”

Today, Contiweb continues to work with Rockfeather. A dedicated Rockfeather Consultant serves as an advisor for both Power BI and TimeXtender, simplifying communication and coordination. In addition, workshops and webinars provide inspiration and insights into the latest developments.

What began as a question from finance about automating reports has evolved into a broader transition. Thanks to the vision of CFO Bart van den Reek and the commitment of Finance Manager Chloe Roizot and her team, Contiweb now has a solid foundation for reliable, data-driven decision-making.

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