Two business models, three entities, one heavy stack
Singa makes karaoke software, serving customers in 34 countries from a beautiful office in an old technical university laboratory building in central Helsinki. There is, of course, an in-house karaoke room. That is where CFO Tiina Hong and Group Financial Controller Satu Tamminen talked us through the group’s consolidation and finance automation.
Behind the fun is a demanding finance setup: three entities in different systems and different currencies, with both B2B and B2C billing running through Stripe. B2C is subscription based, B2B is sales led. The stack is heavy, with multiple lead times before information lands, and it used to be error prone too.
- Revenue data depended on accounting being ready, at best 5 to 7 days after the previous month ended
- Group consolidation was semi-automatic but needed constant upkeep, and broke whenever forecasts were built or data was pulled into Excel
- It was hard to say which customers were new, which churned, and what drove the change from the previous month
That combination is traditionally the trigger for an ERP project. Singa wanted to postpone one as long as possible.
Control has helped us solve the critical problems without a big ERP project.
Tiina Hong, CFO, Singa
Automating what exists instead of starting over
Control connected to the systems Singa already runs and automated the setup that existed, rather than rebuilding everything from scratch.
The first step was connecting all the billing sources, so revenue data arrives in real time. Instead of waiting 5 to 7 days, the numbers are in shape on day one, and analysis is no longer squeezed short. Other teams ask for the numbers during the first day, and there is a culture of wanting them instantly.
One of the first deliverables was the group-level annual report, the Finnish konsernitilinpäätös. The group P&L was ready right away with the new accounting entries. And the monthly revenue change now breaks down cleanly: the team sees which customers are new, which churned, and what drove the difference.
A partner that speaks finance
For Satu Tamminen, the collaboration is as much about the service as the software.
We have been super happy with the service also. Whenever we have some questions or demands, you tell us if you can help, and then you just do it. It's refreshing that we can speak to you as to a finance professional.
Satu Tamminen, Group Financial Controller, Singa
Finance stops being the bottleneck
Singa uses AI heavily across the whole organization, and the finance team is no exception. It keeps developing, improving its processes, and raising the level of automation.
We are really excited about the opportunities with AI and the constant automation we can do. We stop being the bottleneck, anyone in finance can run the close, and the numbers are available faster with better quality and deeper insights.
Satu Tamminen, Group Financial Controller, Singa
Three entities in one group view, revenue on day one, and a group annual report on the same foundation, all without an ERP project. The automation level keeps rising from here.
