IAG puts finance data clean-up at centre of SAP migration
The insurer says removing 40% of its company codes has reduced migration requirements and helped finance teams close accounts faster.
By Quang Dinh
IAG has changed its approach to migrating from SAP ECC to S/4HANA, prioritising finance process improvements and data clean-up as it prepares for potential AI applications, executive manager of digital finance Prashant Shetty said.
Speaking at the SAP NOW AI Tour in Sydney, Shetty said the migration remained under way after several years. The project initially responded to ECC reaching end-of-life and the need to comply with the IFRS 17 accounting standard, but emerging AI capabilities prompted a rethink.
Using SAP’s Signavio, IAG mapped 300-plus processes within finance. Shetty said the work helped the insurer understand bottlenecks and data flows, identify areas for improvement and make better-informed decisions about the migration.
The insurer also removed 40 per cent of its company codes, reducing the data requiring migration. Shetty said this had already delivered operational benefits, including faster financial closes and lower risks associated with maintaining numerous company codes. He said the process and data work had put IAG in a position to accelerate the move.
Shetty, who also oversees AI enablement, said finance teams were examining use cases involving manual reconciliation and data problems. Colleagues across the CFO function were identifying business problems for assessment, he said, stressing that AI needed sound data and processes to deliver value.
