How to Ease the Upgrade to SAP S/4HANA

Recently named one of the world’s 50 most innovative companies by Fast Company media, Utah-based Vivint Smart Home is a leading provider of intelligent home technologies. Vivint sells home-security, energy management, home automation and other solutions to more than a million customers across North America.

Vivint is no stranger to success, so when the company decided to upgrade its ERP system to SAP S/4HANA, it used BlackLine to ease the process.

“We’d been using BlackLine Account Reconciliations with our Great Plains ERP system,” says David Booth, Senior Accountant at Vivint. “We knew we wanted to stay with BlackLine when we moved to S/4HANA, so we did the two upgrades at the same time.

In the Sandbox

“BlackLine helped us immensely because we were able to use BlackLine’s Account Reconciliations and Journal Entry sandboxes to do extensive testing before we went live. And BlackLine helped us keep our account data consistent with our Great Plains reconciliations, so we didn’t have to rebuild all the old reconciliations when we moved to SAP.”

Vivint was also able to reorganize and simplify its account structures. This was a challenge because of the complexity of some Great Plains to SAP account conversions.

“With the upgrade, we reinvented everything, from removing three dimensions from our accounts to changing our numbering structure,” Booth explains. “BlackLine enabled us to test the impact of change, and acted as our trusted, consistent place to run our financial close.”

BlackLine Smart Close is helping Vivint’s accounting group in other ways. By streamlining the journal entry review process, for instance, and by automatically testing and validating journal entries. “We estimate that we’re saving five hours a month on the validation alone,” reports Booth.

Integration Shock and Awe

Vivint used the BlackLine Connector for SAP to expedite the process of configuring and deploying account reconciliations and journal entries.

BlackLine’s integration connector supports the full range of SAP data, from GL balances to subledgers, transactional data and currency rates. It’s validated against SAP product standards and permits secure processing of account reconciliations in the BlackLine cloud without requiring any customizations.

“When it came to installing the integration connector, it was shock and awe,” Booth says. “We installed it and it just worked. That never happens. Until now.”

Download this whitepaper to learn more about how to prepare and maximize your move to SAP S/4HANA.

Recently named one of the world’s 50 most innovative companies by Fast Company media, Utah-based Vivint Smart Home is a leading provider of intelligent home technologies. Vivint sells home-security, energy management, home automation and other solutions to more than a million customers across North America.

Vivint is no stranger to success, so when the company decided to upgrade its ERP system to SAP S/4HANA, it used BlackLine to ease the process.

“We’d been using BlackLine Account Reconciliations with our Great Plains ERP system,” says David Booth, Senior Accountant at Vivint. “We knew we wanted to stay with BlackLine when we moved to S/4HANA, so we did the two upgrades at the same time.

In the Sandbox

“BlackLine helped us immensely because we were able to use BlackLine’s Account Reconciliations and Journal Entry sandboxes to do extensive testing before we went live. And BlackLine helped us keep our account data consistent with our Great Plains reconciliations, so we didn’t have to rebuild all the old reconciliations when we moved to SAP.”

Vivint was also able to reorganize and simplify its account structures. This was a challenge because of the complexity of some Great Plains to SAP account conversions.

“With the upgrade, we reinvented everything, from removing three dimensions from our accounts to changing our numbering structure,” Booth explains. “BlackLine enabled us to test the impact of change, and acted as our trusted, consistent place to run our financial close.”

BlackLine Smart Close is helping Vivint’s accounting group in other ways. By streamlining the journal entry review process, for instance, and by automatically testing and validating journal entries. “We estimate that we’re saving five hours a month on the validation alone,” reports Booth.

Integration Shock and Awe

Vivint used the BlackLine Connector for SAP to expedite the process of configuring and deploying account reconciliations and journal entries.

BlackLine’s integration connector supports the full range of SAP data, from GL balances to subledgers, transactional data and currency rates. It’s validated against SAP product standards and permits secure processing of account reconciliations in the BlackLine cloud without requiring any customizations.

“When it came to installing the integration connector, it was shock and awe,” Booth says. “We installed it and it just worked. That never happens. Until now.”

Download this whitepaper to learn more about how to prepare and maximize your move to SAP S/4HANA.