Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana: operational excellence with private-cloud treasury management
Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana automated treasury operations across 25 companies. A 90% reduction in manual reporting time, with private-cloud data sovereignty.
Customer
Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana, Qatar
Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana selects ZenTreasury
Discover how Qatar-based Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. strategically adopted ZenTreasury and enhanced their treasury department’s efficiency, adaptability, and decision-making capabilities. This case study shows how embracing a private cloud infrastructure allows businesses to retain control over their data while enjoying scalability, security, and flexibility.
Background: Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co.
Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. is a leading business group in Qatar, known for its success and growth since the late 1950s. The company started with simple trading and has grown into a large business operating across cars, real estate, engineering, and more. Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. is especially well-known in the car industry, where it is the main dealer for several top car brands.
As the company grew, it faced challenges. The existing operational processes lacked efficiency. The complexity of managing financial operations and treasury activities became increasingly evident, necessitating a more sophisticated and scalable solution. Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. realized the need for better operational processes to support its growth and decided to look into solutions to stay on top of the market and keep growing sustainably.
The challenge
In today’s fast-paced, digital treasury environment it is necessary to stay up to date. The existing treasury management system was outdated, not scalable, and lacked advanced features. It ran on a local network, which limited the scalability of treasury operations.
The treasury department, overseeing financial transactions across 25 companies within the conglomerate, faced significant challenges in managing cash flow, trade finance, and financial reporting. Their existing system, while functional, lacked the scalability, security, and efficiency required for the group’s growing needs.
“We needed a solution that could evolve with us, providing a consolidated group-level view of liquidity.”
Ebrahim Mattar, Head of Corporate IT
The solution needed to provide a consolidated view and streamline and automate the day-to-day tasks and workflows critical to effective treasury management. ZenTreasury’s cloud-based platform, with its task management and workflow automation features, was selected to revolutionize the way Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. managed its treasury operations.
ZenTreasury: a tailored solution
By implementing ZenTreasury, the company aimed to address the challenges directly. The system’s customizable workflows and task management capabilities were designed to enhance operational efficiency, improve collaboration and control, and ensure data security and accessibility. The platform’s workflows and task management tools allowed for a seamless, automated process that aligned with the conglomerate’s need for a group-wide view of liquidity.
With ZenTreasury, the treasury department could now automate and streamline financial transactions, approvals, and reporting across all 25 companies, significantly reducing manual processes and the potential for errors. The cloud-based nature of the system allowed for remote access, ensuring treasury operations could be managed from anywhere, breaking free from the limitations of a local network.
ZenTreasury implemented a cloud-based treasury management system tailored to the group’s specific requirements. The platform offered a suite of modules designed for comprehensive treasury management, including cash management, loan management, trade finance operations management and task management, all within a secure Private Cloud environment. By moving to a private cloud infrastructure, the following benefits were achieved:
- Scalability and flexibility. The shift from on-site software to a cloud-based solution empowered Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. with remarkable scalability and flexibility. This allows the company to effortlessly tailor its own Azure cloud resources in response to current requirements, enabling autoscaling of server performance and storage size as needed. It eliminates the necessity for substantial upfront investments in hardware or software.
- Customization and feature addition. ZenTreasury’s cloud-based platform allows for greater customization and the addition of specific features tailored to the company’s requirements.
- Enhanced data security and sovereignty. By hosting their database on their own server and utilizing Microsoft Azure for cloud software, Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. maintains high data security and sovereignty standards.
- Improved accessibility and collaboration. Moving to the cloud enabled employees to access the software from anywhere, facilitating remote work and collaboration across geographies.
- Integration capabilities. ZenTreasury’s cloud infrastructure supports various integrations, streamlining processes like bank reconciliations, payments, and financial reporting.
- Data backup and recovery. As a cloud-based system, ZenTreasury offers robust options for data backup and recovery, reducing the risk of data loss due to hardware failure, natural disasters, or cyber-attacks.
- Regular updates and support. ZenTreasury offers regular software updates and support as part of the service, ensuring the system remains up-to-date with the latest features and security patches.
Implementation process
The transition to ZenTreasury was smooth and involved minimal disruption to ongoing operations.
“Our approach was to first understand the requirements of the client thoroughly and then customize our solution to meet those needs.”
The client’s requirements highlighted the necessity for a cloud-based, highly customizable treasury management solution. Customization was at the heart of ZenTreasury’s implementation strategy. The platform was tailored to include specific functionalities such as the equity module, investment property module, and seamless management of transactions through credit cards and checkbooks. This customization process was responsive to the client’s feedback, with regular communication and updates facilitating a dynamic development process.
In terms of infrastructure, ZenTreasury demonstrated flexibility and commitment to data security by accommodating the client’s preference for hosting the software and database on their own servers. This move, together with the utilization of Microsoft Azure for cloud services, emphasized the importance of data integrity and security. The final architecture featured a hybrid approach: an application server managed by ZenTreasury on Google Cloud and a database server hosted on Azure. The Private Cloud infrastructure ensured data security and compliance, addressing the company’s strict requirements for data sovereignty.
ZenTreasury’s cloud infrastructure and intuitive interface facilitated quick adoption across the treasury team and allowed for flexible access from any location.
“ZenTreasury helped us to automate the Treasury. Everything is digitized and manual processes are removed with 90% reduction.”
Testimonials
The new users of ZenTreasury at Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. appreciated the system’s user-friendliness and the ability to attach documents directly, enhancing review and approval processes. Employees highlighted significant time savings, estimating a reduction of five to ten minutes per transaction.
“In the past, we would log into all the banks online and try to look at the balance and write a report and now with one click I can generate a report to understand where my fund is, and how can I pay. That’s probably 90% reduction in time.”
Ebrahim Mattar, Head of Corporate IT
“ZenTreasury has simplified our processes, especially in trade finance and task management. We’re saving approximately five to ten minutes per transaction, which is significant considering our volume of transactions.”
Sajith Lakmadu Vithanage, Treasury Officer, Trade Finance Operations
“The decision making is much faster. If we want to understand our cash flow position, or what the balance is available in our bank, immediately we can find it.”
Ebrahim Mattar, Head of Corporate IT
“Combining manual processes and multiple systems into one platform has significantly improved our efficiency and provided a single source of truth.”
Ebrahim Mattar, Head of Corporate IT
Conclusion
The strategic partnership between Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co. and ZenTreasury demonstrates the transformative potential of technology in treasury management. ZenTreasury’s solutions were designed to tackle the company’s specific challenges and help it operate more efficiently and make better business decisions.
For Saleh Al Hamad Al Mana Co., the move to ZenTreasury’s cloud-based treasury management system has provided significant benefits across scalability, security, accessibility, and cost-effectiveness. The insights presented in this case study can serve as valuable considerations for other companies considering a similar transition to a private cloud infrastructure for their treasury operations.
About ZenTreasury. ZenTreasury is the financial contract accounting engine for the Office of the CFO. Multi-entity IFRS 16, IFRS 9 amortised cost, IAS 21, IAS 37 and FRS 102 today; ASC 842 and IFRS 18 coming soon. Offices in Helsinki, Finland and Dubai.