Group Control at WestLB

SAS Provides German Bank with Valuable Controlling, Marketing and Management Intelligence

WestLB was one of the first German companies to consolidate extensive data about individual transactions in a data warehouse. This information has been regularly evaluated with SAS since 1990 and prepared for use in many different areas within the bank. As part of the company-wide strategy to move to a client-server architecture, the existing reporting system had to be modernized and operating costs lowered. The company was looking for a streamlined solution for group control which could be used to prepare regular standard reports quickly but which would also meet the company's stringent analytical requirements for extensive special evaluations. An intuitive interface was one of the top priorities for WestLB: Users with programming knowledge as well as staff from various departments needed to be able to work independently with the solution – from all WestLB locations throughout the world. To meet these needs, WestLB chose the SAS Integration Technologies and SAS Enterprise Guide.

The Most Efficient Solution
Decision makers at WestLB were aware that SAS provided the most efficient solutions for the complete group control system, even when directly compared with other standard solutions. Today, around 200 standard evaluations a month are available for a variety of target groups: the Controlling departments receive prompt analyses of customer profitability and cost centre results. The Financial Department uses evaluations for drawing up balance sheets and parts of the internal and external reporting system, and the data quality officers are guided to a large extent by plausibility checks produced by SAS. In addition, various SAS evaluations are used as a basis for the figures in the management reports for the company's management and the Supervisory Board.

Because of its excellent performance capacity, many different areas of the bank increasingly use the SAS solutions for individual evaluations and special projects. SAS provides valuable knowledge not only for company audits by the internal audit department or for identifying cost drivers in the area of administration, but also for WestLB's strategic marketing. Here, the solution reveals promising cross-selling and up-selling potential. The SAS solutions were indispensable during the reorganization involved when the Landesbank and WestLB AG separated. In particular, correctly assigning the business transactions, (which were so intricately connected in terms of content) to the new companies made tough demands on data management. With SAS, it was possible in just a short time to allocate stocks without errors, integrate business accounts, complete the new data system and prepare new balances.

Helps Many, Costs Less
Approximately 200 employees from Germany and abroad work actively with the SAS solutions. A further 100 employees regularly receive completed SAS evaluations. The thousands of customer connections and cost centres create millions of data sets and require even greater plausibility checks and data quality controls. Here, the SAS solutions can detect contradictory data or incorrect information in margins or business figures. This makes SAS a vital tool in uncovering and removing data quality problems – the essential foundation for optimum analyses. The people responsible also say it has been a complete success in terms of costs. The operating costs for the SAS solutions are 50 percent lower than the expected costs of the continued operation of the old host solution.

The Benefits of the SAS Solutions

• Reduced operating costs
• Intuitive interface for users without any knowledge of statistics
• Rapid evaluation of multi-dimensional or linked queries
• Improved data quality through plausibility checks and data streamlining
• Simple production of over 200 standard evaluations
• Dynamic, flexible evaluation options
• Little training required
• Evaluation reports generated as pdf or html documents
• Very easy to process the evaluations further since they can be exported in dBASE, Excel or Access format

Smooth Implementation
The SAS solution was implemented smoothly and quickly at WestLB. Realization of the project took just six months with the efficient support provided by SAS Professional Services. This meant that the project was not only finished on time, but also stayed within the budget. WestLB is very happy with the SAS training courses and the services provided by customer support. "The SAS Professional Services staff is very competent and friendly. They always give us the feeling that our problems are being taken seriously," says Axel Pfannenmüller, head of management reporting at WestLB.

About WestLB
WestLB AG is one of Germany's leading financial services providers. As a globally active commercial bank, it has branches, representative offices and subsidiaries in over 30 countries and employs around 8,700 people worldwide, including 3,500 outside Germany.

WestLB AG is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Landesbank NRW, which is an institution under public law whose shareholders are the State of North Rhine Westphalia, the Rheinische Sparkassen- und Giroverband (Rhine Association of Savings and Giro Banks), the Westfälisch-Lippische Sparkassen- und Giroverband (Westphalian-Lippish Association of Savings and Giro Banks) and the Landschaftsverbände Rheinland und Westfalen (Associations of rural mortgage banks of Rhineland and Westphalia).

The results illustrated in this article are specific to the particular situations, business models, data input, and computing environments described herein. Each SAS customer’s experience is unique based on business and technical variables and all statements must be considered non-typical. Actual savings, results, and performance characteristics will vary depending on individual customer configurations and conditions. SAS does not guarantee or represent that every customer will achieve similar results. The only warranties for SAS products and services are those that are set forth in the express warranty statements in the written agreement for such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an additional warranty. Customers have shared their successes with SAS as part of an agreed-upon contractual exchange or project success summarization following a successful implementation of SAS software. Brand and product names are trademarks of their respective companies.

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