Building a powerful new reporting platform

Our private equity client was committed to transforming its overall approach to reporting across its 25 funds. But they wanted to see a clear business case, implementation plan, and tested path to return on investment (ROI). Here’s how our KPMG team worked with them to make that happen.

Phase 1: Enablement and testing — Establishing the business case, proving the concept

Beginning in late Spring 2023, our KPMG team worked with the client to build the business case and develop the overall project roadmap, drawing on our extensive experience with Workiva, including facilitating discussions around licensing options that would scale up over the first two phases. 

Phase 1 focused on initial enablement and testing of the Workiva platform, starting with 5 of the firm’s 25 funds. This first phase kicked off in late June and ran through early September. Key steps included:

• Establishing project governance and regular reviews with the steering group
• Functional design and implementation of the Workiva platform, which manages the front-end report content assets, templates, and workflows
• Technical design and implementation of the Workiva platform, which manages all of the required back-end data
• Identifying all potential data needs, building API connections to the client source systems, and then mapping them through for always-on availability in the Workiva database
• Connecting and testing integration between the Workiva platform and Wdata implementations
• Building initial investor reports, including custom images, graphs, and review-and-approval processes
• Testing reports to ensure accuracy of both unique and common data elements
• Go-live deployment of all reports for the first five funds in Week 12
• Training for the client’s teams and ongoing support and monitoring for the newly live platform.

Phase 3: Expansion and optimization — Extending the capabilities

The originally planned two-phase project was completed in 19 weeks—on time, on budget, and exceeding expectations. It was so immediately successful for the client that a third phase was added to further extend and optimize the reporting capabilities. That work is ongoing and includes:

• Batch-reporting to support autoscheduled reports for all 25 funds at once
• More customized reporting—from one-page summaries to expanded quarterly reports and investor relations packages—that improve the customer experience for the client’s limited partners and enhance its marketing materials
• Enhanced and customized internal controls to help ensure reporting accuracy, including quarter-to-quarter analysis, data quality controls, dashboards, etc.
• Additional workflow automations that continue to shave time off the review cycles
• Opportunities to expand Workiva’s capabilities to support other areas of the business, such as valuations, distributions, tax reporting, and more.

Unlocking the value within

In just 19 weeks, our client was able to transform its fund reporting operations and tap into new value for both the firm and its limited partners. Reports that previously took multiple weeks to create can now be generated in minutes. Fund managers have more time to spend on developing unique insights for their clients, thanks to Workiva’s user experience, which allows them to generate ad-hoc reports for specific partners. The new platform also future-proofs the company for any new regulatory changes through its ability to easily add or adjust reporting requirements. Beyond just the ongoing cost and time savings, the client’s transformative new approach to reporting empowers fund managers to focus a lot more on what they do best: driving value for their partners and generating new business for the firm.