Eclipse Computing helps replace eight local systems with one
package.
The Council for International Educational Exchange, which organises
international work and study programmes, has replaced its legacy
applications based at its eight global locations with standard
SunSystems accounting and business management software.
The council says it has improved information visibility and
decision-support processes as it continues to expand student
numbers undertaking work and study exchange programmes throughout
the world.
Since 1947, the CIEE has been a world leader in international work
and study opportunities enabling students, graduates and
professionals to work, teach or volunteer in countries around the
globe.
The organisation currently serves more than 25,000 students
annually.
Before the implementation of SunSystems' package, the financial
management of the organisation had been handled locally, resulting
in the implementation of different financial and accounting systems
in the eight locations globally. The resulting different programme
codes and methods of reporting made central consolidation of
financial information difficult to achieve.
As Brooke Squire, vice-president of the CIEE, explains, "To expand
the businesses globally and ensure consistent programme quality
across all the regions, the CIEE needed to easily reconcile
financial information centrally."
To achieve this goal, the council decided to replace the legacy
solutions with one standard solution globally. "We wanted a
financial solution with one chart of accounts to support financial
consolidation," Squire says.
"The system also had to be designed and proven for multinational
business, in terms of multi-currency and lingual support and
meeting local regulations."
Having conducted an extensive review of the financial accounting
software market, the CIEE created a shortlist of three products.
Further assessment led to the choice of SunSystems. "It was the
most proven multinational system with many implementations globally
and the company has a good development reputation," Squire
says.
The CIEE then opted to work with financial systems reseller Eclipse
Computing on the global roll-out. "At the time we had a sister
company, Council Travel, that had also purchased SunSystems and
successfully used Eclipse for the implementation which gave us a
lot of confidence. In addition, Eclipse offered support across our
eight offices which was very important," says Squire.
Eclipse advised the CIEE to deploy SunSystems on NT, SQL Server and
Windows 2000 with individual servers in each location. For
consolidation purposes, on a monthly basis, each international
office would transmit a summary file to head-office for further
analysis and reporting.
"As a non-profit organisation, good central information is worth
its weight in gold," Squire says.