Avance Clinical

Background

With business growth comes unexpected challenges

Avance Clinical is a leading CRO with an impressive 52% market share. The company is favored for its ability to deliver high-quality clinical research while reducing the time and cost of getting therapies to market.

As a CRO, Avance Clinical’s operations are highly regulated. Along with strict industry regulations, their internal workflows deal with complex financial relations involving various stakeholders (hospitals, pharmacies, etc.). As the organization grew, it became evident that there was a growing need for better utilization, financial tracking, and projected cost visibility—abilities its manual processes could no longer satisfy.

By implementing Certinia’s PS Cloud and FM Cloud, Avance Clinical aimed to enhance visibility into its financial data—which was key to improving forecasting and strategic business planning.

Challenge

Lack of timely, comprehensive financial insights leads to reactive planning

As Avance Clinical expanded globally, it outgrew its operational infrastructure consisting of manual processes. Its increasing need for timely and comprehensive visibility into project financial data became apparent due to these factors:

• Delays in accessing financial insights
  Manual processes made it difficult to access financial data in real time. Without timely reports helping leadership evaluate business health and performance, decisions were often delayed.
• Interdepartmental disconnects
  Without a unified financial database, departments struggled to manage budgets efficiently. This, in turn, affected resource planning for projects.
• Inaccurate forecasting
  Lack of data visibility hindered future trend predictions. This made it harder to plan for upcoming projects, determine project budgets, and provide customers visibility into projected costs. 

Lack of insights into resource requirements also hindered effective resource allocation and utilization.

Solution

Real-time data and analytics improve forecasting accuracy, departmental visibility, and resource utilization

Avance Clinical turned to Exceleris Consulting, a boutique consultancy specializing in customer relationship management (CRM), professional services automation (PSA), and enterprise resource planning (ERP) transformations. Being familiar with the CRO industry, Exceleris Consulting grasped Avance Clinical’s unique processes and recommended Certinia PS Cloud and FM Cloud as the best-fit solutions.

Enhanced financial visibility

Avance Clinical revolutionized its approach to financial data using Certinia PS Cloud and FM Cloud. With Certinia, they took revenue snapshots and reviewed backlog data every first day of the month. This provided them with an accurate point-in-time view of their financial performance.

Optimized resource utilization

Empowered by deeper insights into their financial performance, department heads leveraged a bottom-up and top-down budgeting approach to manage budgets and effectively align with business goals. Granular insights into projected resource requirements also enabled Avance Clinical to ensure that their customer projects are resourced at the right level and at the right time.

Greater cost transparency for customers

Enhanced forecasting capabilities allowed Avance Clinical to give customers greater visibility into projected costs—an important consideration for biotech customers. This ultimately strengthened Avance Clinical’s client relationships.

Increased departmental accountability and empowerment

PS Cloud and FM Cloud’s comprehensive and unified database provided Avance Clinical department heads with enhanced real-time data capabilities, allowing them to take ownership of financial planning and resource allocation.

Improved forecasting accuracy and business planning

Real-time data and analytics helped Avance Clinical achieve more accurate forecasting for short-term and long-term business planning. This empowered the leadership team to predict future trends, supporting proactive—and not reactive—decision-making.