Tech Mahindra’s new AceFin solution offers contextualized CFO process insights

Global IT and business service provider Tech Mahindra has launched a new finance and accounting (F&A) solution called AceFin, designed to address the multiple priorities of chief financial officers (CFOs), underpinned by access to data.

AceFin covers the range of insight to action for CFOs who need to make critical decisions based on data

The solution provides real-time information and insights enabling finance teams to make data-driven decisions. The solution’s AI-based prediction system offers five to six levels of drill-down analysis that can be useful for tactical and strategic decision making.

With its ability to connect to any platform and tools to extract and load data, AceFin provides a unified view of all financial data in a single platform. AceFin could, for example, import benchmarking data from external sources and offer a comprehensive comparison of how a company performs against its competitors on various financial metrics.

The most compelling feature, in our view, is the platform’s ability to provide insights and dashboarding and execute associated tasks and processes. For example, if a company noticed on AceFin that some invoices were due for payment, it could trigger actions from the platform to send payment reminders to customers. Further, using built-in, AI-based prediction systems coupled with the company’s customizations and rules engines, the system could predict customer behavior and take tailored actions for certain types of customers (e.g., first-time defaulters might get a softer touch vs. repeat offenders).

Built around the Celonis tech stack, Tech Mahindra has thought through multiple commercial models for different client needs

AceFin results from Tech Mahindra’s brainstorming sessions on market needs, further bolstered by customer feedback during prototyping. The service provider is in advanced talks with a few customers to implement the solution in their environment. Tech Mahindra has partnered with its platinum partner, process intelligence leader Celonis, to develop the F&A solution. However, AceFin is a Tech Mahindra product, and customers do not have to invest in separate licenses for any third-party tools outside of the AceFin subscription.

AceFin has three models of engaging clients: a commercial model, a subscription model, and a license model. The commercial model is a subscription and license package. The subscription model has two variants, including the ability to identify root causes and a more elaborate process execution-oriented solution that also suggests workflow alerts and drives end-to-end metrics. The license model has three different versions for small, medium, and large enterprises in terms of usage.

While AceFin is a promising solution for enterprises looking to improve their CFO’s decision-making process, there are potential challenges that Tech Mahindra may need to address to help clients adopt a solution of this nature. Many organizations still struggle with data quality and accessibility, making them unable to reap the benefits of AceFin. Additionally, while the solution’s various subscription and license models make it affordable and flexible, the cost of implementation and training for the solution might be challenging for some enterprises. Many clients may have invested in standalone process intelligence and workflow solutions.

The Bottom Line: AceFin by Tech Mahindra provides finance leaders with a prepackaged F&A process intelligence and execution solution to make data-driven decisions, but not every enterprise is going to be ready for it.

Despite the potential challenges, adopting solutions like AceFin could give traditional finance organizations better data access and analytics. Ultimately, the benefits must be tied to measurable results, including greater operational efficiency and business metrics like working capital optimization.