OREANDA-NEWS. November 09, 2015. SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) today announced enhancements to the SAP Revenue Accounting and Reporting application designed to help communications service providers (CSPs) simplify preparations for upcoming changes in International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). The IFRS changes will have significant impact on how carriers recognize revenue. The software enhancements simplify the tasks of archiving large amounts of data, updating forward- and backward-looking information, and integrating with the SAP hybris Billing solution.

In May 2014 the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) and Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) set new revenue accounting standards, which will have a significant impact on revenue recognition in the telecommunications industry. These changes supersede all existing revenue guidance under IFRS and US GAAP. The mandatory regulations will require operators to change the way they allocate revenue on the stand-alone selling price of a handset and the monthly service plan sold along with it. These revenue recognition changes are expected to affect CSP key performance indicators, such as profit and loss, and current and future system implementations.

Developed closely with SAP’s customers, partners and own accounting department, SAP Revenue Accounting and Reporting automates the revenue recognition and accounting process and enables CFOs to run simpler as they adhere to the new standards. The enhanced solution provides a holistic view of the customer and eases the task of making prospective and retrospective changes to customer data. The solution helps increase the visibility and accuracy of returned goods data by linking data from various software systems. This holistic view can help prevent operators from, for example, counting a replacement handset as a new sale, which would result in inaccurate revenue records.

“The road to compliance with new IFRS standards will be disruptive for telcos,” said Rick Costanzo, executive vice president and general manager, telecommunications industry and SAP HANA Cloud Platform and mobile solutions, SAP. “But within disruption lies opportunity, and that is why we are encouraging customers to move to a digital core powered by the SAP HANA platform. The ability to run the business in real time will allow operators to adapt more quickly to changing business needs and seize new business opportunities while achieving and maintaining regulatory compliance.”

The enhanced SAP Revenue Accounting and Reporting application helps users:

  • Gain deep insight into revenue data
  • Increase customer loyalty and satisfaction
  • Drive additional revenue by up-selling and cross-selling
  • Address revenue leakage and fraud
  • Perform business processes better and faster

SAP Revenue Accounting and Reporting, version 1.1, is available for early-adoption customers as part of the SAP Ramp-Up program.