Forecasting plays a pivotal role in the effective running of a pharmaceutical business and delivering treatments to patients who need them. Robust and insightful forecasts enable informed decision-making around activities such as asset acquisition and product development, and lack of foresight can have potentially catastrophic consequences.
J+D were approached by a global pharmaceutical company who needed a new forecasting solution with a robust process management system to give them a solid foundation when forecasting their pipeline assets.
Several members of their global forecasting team had previously attended a two-day Fundamentals of Forecasting training course delivered by J+D and were aware of our expertise and abilities so approached us to discuss their issues and discover potential solutions.
The company’s current solution lacked the flexibility they needed. To boost efficiency, they needed a central forecasting environment, where files and models could be stored in one place, insights readily available, and with a high level of access and control.
The Challenges
- No standard approach to saving files with no naming conventions, making file location arduous.
- Difficulty sharing models across regions and countries.
- Navigating between different scenarios and models was challenging with a need to increase the number of scenarios they could create.
- Forecast consolidation was both time consuming and difficult to interpret.
- Inconsistency in forecasts making it time-consuming to access insights and reports for different models.
J+D’s FC365 forecasting platform was the ideal solution for this client. Sitting in their internal IT environment, they would keep a high level of forecasting independence whilst attaining the flexibility and customisation they required for effective synergy with internal processes.
As the models built in FC365 are developed in Excel, an already familiar and trusted tool, it removed the need to learn a new software, bringing huge benefits by shortening the learning curve for their team. Additionally, as the solution runs in Microsoft Teams, it would be easy to save files, access content, share and collaborate in a platform they already used on a daily basis across the company.
Working Together
In order to find the right solution for this client, J+D carried out an in-depth organisational process flow analysis, following extensive senior level stakeholder interviews and a thorough audit of current processes. This highlighted key inefficiencies to be addressed and identified how FC365 would be customised by our experts to achieve a standardised forecasting process.
J+D began work on the system build, developing new forecast models and creating a series of in-depth FC365 analytics dashboards. These powerful reports display insightful visuals from the forecasts, updating in real-time whenever a forecast is created or updated within the platform.
A change management process was implemented, and training was delivered by J+D’s forecasting experts to ensure the launch and integration was smooth and effective for their team.
FC365 is now successfully hosted in their internal IT environment with all files and models securely stored and accessible from one central cloud-based location, making it easier to navigate between scenarios and models, find and share files and collaborate locally and regionally.
The power of the extra functionalities of the platform, such as the ability to archive a project and easily create new scenarios has been huge. The team are now in control of their data and have access to quick and seamless analysis of forecasts with automated processes, and the FC365 analytics have been described as a game-changer to the business.
The combination of a structured change management process, high level training and ongoing support from J+D’s forecasting experts ensured the smooth launch of the FC365 forecasting platform on time and to requirements. This client now has a consistent approach to forecasting across the business allowing them to build robust forecasts efficiently and evaluate pipeline assets in line with best practice principles.
“The FC365 platform has revolutionised our forecasting. Models are easy to find and manage, while the analytic reports give great insights.”
Global Forecasting Manager
Global Forecasting Manager
Built on the functionality you know and trust, our FC365 Application empowers better decision making through effective insight generation and visualisation thanks to J+D. We simplify the complex nature of forecasting with a centralised process in one, shared cloud-based interface and generate captivating visual outputs and detailed reports which can be customised and changed at the touch of a button.
FC365 is an innovative support system for informed decision making about the future. Want to learn more? Contact us to book a demo
