AMANA Switzerland
AMANA Switzerland LLC, the foreign subsidiary of AMANA Consulting GmbH, offers software solutions in the areas of tax and financial processes, and is the direct contact for customers in Switzerland.
We support you on-site with a smooth integration of our software solutions into your processes. We are also available to help you, to answer any questions you may have, and we are happy to receive suggestions.
AMANA Schweiz introduces itself
AMANA Switzerland LLC is the first foreign subsidiary of AMANA Consulting GmbH Germany. Our number of customers has risen to 1000 since 2010. With our reference customers in Switzerland and Liechtenstein, we have been firmly established in the market for years.
AMANA emerged in 2011 from a spin-off of the accounting consultancy of PricewaterhouseCoopers AG WPG (PWC) and developed successfully. AMANA Switzerland LLC acts as the direct contact for customers in Switzerland.
AMANA Switzerland LLC is represented by Elena Serova who acts as the Managing Director. Elena has many years of professional experience as a consultant and most recently as an investor engagement leader at PwC Switzerland with projects in Switzerland, Germany, France, UK, Japan, and the USA. She is at your disposal as your direct contact.
AMANA Consulting GmbH in Switzerland is represented by Dr. Philipp Stampfuß and Thorsten Funke. Philipp and Thorsten have been two of four managing directors since the formation of AMANA Consulting GmbH in Germany.
Another expert is our XBRL product manager Richard Bössen. Richard is a member of the board of XBRL Switzerland association and is responsible for numerous projects in this area.
Our software solutions
Financial reports in XBRL
With the introduction of ESEF (European Single Electronic Standard) from ESMA (European Securities and Markets Authority), more and more companies will publish their data in XBRL format (eXtensible Business Reporting Language). In the future, analysts will increasingly use the data for XBRL reporting. At our last user conference in Essen, attended by around 400 clients every year, experienced analyst Marietta Miemietz from Primavenue Advisory Services Limited gave a presentation and pointed out the following aspects of XBRL: Cost efficiency, speed, accuracy, and the ability to design your own Alternative Performance Measurements (APMs).
In Switzerland, some companies are also affected by the ESEF requirement. As a proven XBRL expert with the most certifications from XBRL International, we are happy to support you in implementing this requirement. Firstly, with the help of SmartNotes and secondly, with the help of the XBRL Tagger. We would like to invite you to current webinars for SmartNotes and XBRL Tagger.
Our client projects
Swissquote Bank
We are using SmartNotes for our Annual Report production process. All contents are maintained in SmartNotes in a ready-to-publish format from Word including the following parts: Financial Report, Remuneration Report, Corporate Governance Report as well as Sustainability Report. The numbers in the tables, charts and texts are interconnected and connected to the source data, they are updated automatically for each data load throughout the report. SmartNotes has significantly helped us to automate the process and reduced the correction efforts.
TITAN Cement Group
We have prepared our first ESEF audited report (European Single Electronic Format) with the help of AMANA and their solution XBRL Tagger. The project started with a full test on the financial report from the prior year which was reviewed afterwards. The production of the report at the end of 2020 went very smoothly despite a very short period for the year-end closing process. The support was excellent and the ESEF consulting competence was outstanding. We met our deadline and filed our ESEF report at the Belgian Officially Appointed Mechanism for ESEF reports FSMA (Financial Services and Markets Authority) in Brussels in English and French on the planned date.
Allianz Suisse
What we appreciate about GTC are the automation possibilities for our processes as well as the specific cantonal requirements from Swiss tax law that are reflected in the software. We have been using GTC in the tax compliance area since 2014. In particular, the allocation of the taxable result according to Circular 23 for insurance companies (Kreisschreiben 23) at the cantonal and municipal level, as well as the processing of payments for the verification of tax assessments and the calculation of tax provisions are very beneficial for us. The GTC also convinced us with its flexibility in integrating different data sources.
EFG International
We use SmartNotes for EFGI - Annual Report, Interim Report, Press Releases and for Pillar III report. We also use SmartNotes for various subsidiary annual reports including subsidiaries is Switzerland, UK and Luxembourg. All theses reports are produced with final layout in Word without use of InDesign. The highly sophisticated functionality for financials (roll-forward, validations, automated numbers in text, ect.) helps us significantly to automate the processes of report production and ensure alignment between annual reports and press releases. The implementation project was an excellent experience for all team members.
Geberit
Geberit has been using SmartNotes for many years. Our online annual report has an interface with SmartNotes. The data is transferred from the financial report via interface to the online report. The interface processes not only the financial figures but also the formats, so that manual post-processing in the online report is largely eliminated. The manual steps that do not add value have thus been eliminated from the process.
HIAG
We use SmartNotes in the Azure Microsoft cloud environment. SmartNotes significantly helps us to streamline the report production process. A direct interface to our consolidation system as well as a ready-to-print preparation of the reports without InDesign eliminate the manual steps and the risks of errors in the process. After a very good implementation project together with AMANA, we can independently expand the application areas of SmartNotes and implement further reports in SmartNotes.
Richemont
Richemont uses SmartNotes for external and internal reports. For us, the key advantages include saving time with automated numbers in tables and text as well as the roll-forward process, being able to work in parallel as SmartNotes allows several people to work on the same document at once and internal consistency within the reports and between the reports, for example between annual report and annual analyst presentation or interim report and interim analyst presentation. Smartnotes has also helped us to improve the efficiency of our internal reporting.
FMA
The Financial Market Authority Liechtenstein collaborates with AMANA for many years. For us, AMANA is first and foremost an XBRL specialist with in-depth XBRL expertise and a global reach. This expertise, which is based on many years of XBRL experience, was crucial for us and the key factor for project success. Furthermore, AMANA is continuing to support us in projects implementing multiple requirements from European Authorities, for example MiFID II (Markets in Financial Instruments Directive II), AIFMD (Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive) and others. AMANA supports us with the development of our national statutory reporting taxonomy as well.
BEKB / BCBE
We have been using SmartNotes for our financial reporting since 2012. The functionalities for financials in SmartNotes impressed us a lot from the beginning. SmartNotes is easy to use and we act independently when making report adjustments or creating new reports in SmartNotes. We use the tool for both external and internal reporting. For internal reporting, we have implemented our management reports in both Word and Power Point formats. The use of SmartNotes has significantly reduced the risk of errors. At the same time, efficiency has been increased thanks to the automation of routine work.
Primeo Energie
We use SmartNotes to compile four independent annual reports, one group report, and three segment reports. From the point of view of communication and procedures, it was crucial for us that the reports, created with Word, were fully ready for printing. SmartNotes fulfills this task skillfully. In particular, we benefit from automation advantages, especially in the financial reporting sector. In addition, from the outset we now have only print-ready reports in our internal process, which is very helpful and efficient for corrections or content coordination.
Glencore
We implemented SmartNotes for our financial and production reporting and have reached a high level of automation in our work process. The excellent functionalities for numbers as well as the design implementation within SmartNotes has made the reporting process both more efficient and completely transparent. The SmartNotes project team supported us competently and professionally throughout the entire implementation period.Being a listed company on the London stock exchange we are using Smartnotes to prepare the ESEF report (European Single Electronic Format), with taggings of primary statements as well as notes to the financial statements. We performed the project with internal resources and the support from AMANA, using their competences in both areas XBRL technical and accounting. The integration of XBRL tagging into SmartNotes has allowed us to further enhance the automation in the report production process.
Idorsia
SmartNotes significantly facilitates Idorsia’s Financial Reporting process and was particularly helpful in the IPO (Initial Public Offering) process and for the first financial reporting a few weeks after the demerger. Using the strong collaboration and review capabilities, and how layout changes can be easily implemented, SmartNotes allows to focus on quality and consistency.
Haniel
During our decision process for the best software solution to fulfill the IFRS 16 requirements, the GlobalLeaseCenter convinced us by the following competitive advantages: on the one hand, it is flexible and therefore easy to integrate into our IT environment and on the other hand, the project team from AMANA was highly competent in both areas in IFRS and in IT specific technical details.
Duferco
We are using SmartNotes for two reports on a quarterly/semiannual basis. SmartNotes has a highly sophisticated functionality for financial reports and helps us to concentrate on content while automating numbers in tables in text. The roll-forward functionality is also very helpful and allows us to produce the first versions of the next period reports in just couple of minutes. Although we are not a public company, with no requirement to publish our financial statements, we nevertheless use the Layout Robot feature to prepare internal reports with professional layouts for our main stakeholders (shareholders and banks).
Caleffi S. p. A.
Amana: a safe and reliable partner for the preparation of consolidated financial statements according to the European single electronic standard (ESEF). I greatly appreciated the professional competence, precision and availability that the Amana team dedicated to the work of preparing the financial statements in XHTML format, using Amana's XBRL Tagger.
Restart S. p. A.
Amana: a safe and reliable partner for the preparation of consolidated financial statements according to the European single electronic standard (ESEF). I greatly appreciated the professional competence, precision and availability that the Amana team dedicated to the work of preparing the financial statements in XHTML format, using Amana's XBRL Tagger.
Covivio
The introduction of the software was straightforward and simple. The introduction of VAT@GTC has made our reporting process much more efficient. Even complex VAT groups can be easily handled and consolidated with the AMANA software. Since using the software we have been saving a lot of time.
CtrlPrint
We have successfully integrated AMANA's XBRL Tagger, a certified XBRL solution, into CtrlPrint to enable our corporate users to make their financial reports ESEF-ready in a fast and effective way. In our tagging sessions in December 2019, 30 listed companies were able, to a very large extent, tag previous year's annual report and create iXBRL reports as a perfect basis for the 2020 report, fulfilling ESMA requirements. Our users, who in general are not familiar with XBRL, were impressed by the easy-to-use functionality of AMANA's XBRL Tagger and the way it played down ESEF/XBRL to something more familiar. We are convinced that it is a perfect addition to our report collaboration tool.
Arkk solutions
Arkk use AMANA's software to provide an outsourced iXBRL tagging service. The software is easy to use and intuitive for both the user and the reviewer. The team at AMANA have been very responsive with incorporating feedback into the software and have been great to work with. We have received some super feedback on the iXBRL output from a number of our clients, especially around the ease of review.
gategroup
We use GlobalTaxCenter (GTC) for our group-wide tax reporting processes worldwide, for example in our units in Asia, Africa and the North America. The integrated link between actual and deferred taxes saves us a significant amount of time during the year end process. The automated tax rate reconciliation serves as an important input for the preparation of the notes in the financial report. The GTC meets our expectations for process digitisation in the area of tax reporting very well.
Meyer Burger
AMANA supported us in the implementation oft he SmartNotes Disclosure Management System for external reporting. The implementation project and the automated processes were an excellent experience for our team. In our Annual Report all major contents including our Financial Reports as well as the ESG contents (Environment, Social and Governance) oft he report are maintained in SmartNotes. The charts have been built in Excel according tot he Corporate Design standards with automated data feeds. The source system is IBM Cognos with automated connections to numbers in charts, tables and to numbers in the text. The ready-to-publish format from Word eliminated the manual InDesign work and significantly improved the process effiency.
Pilatus
"As a non-public company with no requirement to publish our IFRS consolidated financial statements, we decided to implement the Disclosure Management System SmartNotes to improve the effiency of our report preparation process and are very happy with the outcome of the implementation project. We are using SmartNotes for consolidated financial statements with data imports from Cognos Controller as well for financial reports in Switzerland and aboroad with data imports from SAP (RFBILAoo). SmartNotes has a highly sophisticated functionality for financial reports and eliminates many manual steps; it helps us to dedicate our time to content and to IFRS content driven projects, for example, in our recent streamlining project for the IFRS consolidated financial statements."
Thüga Aktiengesellschaft
"We implementated the VAT@GTC software with AMANA consulting GmbH in order to automate the preparation of VAT returns and to map the processes in an audit-proof manner. The implementation was quick and uncomplicated, also thanks to the very good AMANA team. Especially with the short-term VAT reduction in 2020 to 16%, the advantage of the easily accessible and very helpful AMANA support has paid off. With this software, we are certainly well equipped for our upcoming tax compliance management system."
Volkswagen AG
By introducing VAT@GTC, our reporting process has become much more efficient. Even complex tax groups can be easily handled and consolidated with the AMANA software. Since using the software, we have saved a significant amount of time.
Envia Mitteldeutsche Energie AG
We have already been using VAT@GTC for several years. Since we have had very good experiences with the software and the AMANA team, we have helped to design and further develop the new VAT audit module for voucher level audits as an implementation partner. As a result, audits at voucher level have also been possible since this year.
Gropyus AG
I am very convinced of VAT@GTC. I have already introduced the software in two companies. We are about to go live in Germany and Austria.
Duisburger Versorgungs- und Verkehrsgesellschaft mbH
The implementation of the software was straightforward and simple. Even though VAT is very complex, it can be clearly presented and handled with VAT@GTC. Our processes have become much more efficient thanks to VAT@GTC.
VIEGA HOLDING GMBH & CO. KG
The introduction of VAT Audit has worked very well. During the project, there was always an open exchange between Viega and the AMANA project team. Suggestions and individual requirements for the VAT Audit were received positively by AMANA, so that important adjustments could be made to the system in cooperation for us.
Bayer AG
With the implementation of SmartNotes, we have continuously improved our financial statement preparation process. The interfaces to the pre-system and the flexibility within the tool ensure that our accounts are always transparent and comprehensible. This not only saves time, but also enormously reduces the error rate in the preparation process. Thanks to the automated support in terms of design and layout, we can concentrate on the content aspects until publication. The SmartNotes support team has always supported us well in this and has always been competently available to answer questions as well as comments.
BLG LOGISTICS GROUP AG & CO. KG
By implementing SmartNotes in our processes, we were able to automate the creation of our annual reports, our ESEF reporting and other internal and external reports. This has not only enabled us to save capacity in the long term, but also to reduce the length of the creation process and the paper-based correction loops to a minimum. Above all, the efficient number management as well as the creation of finished PDF reports have reduced the reconciliation processes in our company. In addition, the SmartNotes project and support team was always there to help us with any questions.
Deutsche Großbank
A major German bank uses the AMANA XBRL Engine to generate its FINREP/COREP reports. AMANA has developed a web service (‘XBRL Bridge’) that can import data from the ‘Financial Data Warehouse’ (Oracle database) in order to generate XBRL instances from them. In addition, the instances can be validated (XBRL Formula Validation + Custom Validation) and visualised (Excel reports). The XBRL Bridge of Deutsche Bank is accessed via a web-based interface (Java).
Currently over 80 users work with our solution. To date, hundreds of FINREP|COREP|AE instances have been transmitted using the XBRL Bridge by all European group entities. Among the recipients of the XBRL reports is the Bundesbank as well as the FCA in the UK, the Banco de Portugal and others. Deutsche Bank was the first bank in Europe to submit the reports on time.
We worked closely with the authorities to optimise the new process. The ECB referred explicitly to the largest XBRL report submitted by the Deutsche Bank in November 2014 – because it overtaxed the undersized systems of the ECB.
Pass Consulting
MULTIBANK is a foreign banking system of the PASS Consulting Group; it is a user-oriented core banking system for private banks and foreign banks. Based on Microsoft Dynamics NAV®, it provides modular support for the specific requirements and complex processes of a bank. The AMANA XBRL Engine is used for FINREP|COREP reports. By integrating the AMANA XBRL Engine ‘invisibly’ in the core banking software, PASS Consulting offers its clients a perfect ‘in-house’ solution. Over 20 banks have implemented the PASS core banking software today, using our processor to send their monthly and other required European XBRL reports. We played a coaching role for the PASS Consulting employees responsible for the client implementations. Thanks to this multiplier effect our product was quickly adopted by many banks.
Our contact persons
- Dr. Philipp Stampfuss
- T +49 201 94 622 885
- philipp.stampfuss@amana.de
- Dr. Philipp Stampfuss @ LinkedIn
- Thorsten Funke
- T +49 201 94 622 877
- thorsten.funke@amana.de
- Thorsten Funke @ LinkedIn
- Richard Bössen
- T +41 61 333 2000
- richard.boessen@amana.de
- Richard Bössen @ LinkedIn
Our references
Webinars
Disclosure Management SmartNotes: End-to-end process to the annual report
Our Disclosure Management SmartNotes increases the efficiency in the creation of annual reports and iXBRL reports and helps you to implement the ESEF requirements. Work with SmartNotes from the first data import, through the input of corrections, to the publication of the annual report in a print-ready layout without media discontinuity. Our Disclosure Management System relieves you of the manual work steps so that you can concentrate on essential content.
Referents: Björn Bielesch and Nina Schüller
SmartNotes - Layout-Roboter, InDesign-Converter and SN-Layout-Helper
With our two-part SmartNotes layout module - consisting of the InDesign Converter and the Layout Robot - we enable you to create a print-ready report directly from SmartNotes. You can take two different paths with our solutions. If you continue to work with your external layout agency or your internal layout team, e.g. your IR department, then you can use our InDesign Converter to avoid time-consuming and costly correction loops. With it, you can do up to 80% of the preliminary work in terms of layout and provide your agency with a directly processable document. Alternatively, you can use our layout robot in SmartNotes to create a print-ready report. It can be flexibly adapted to your table layout and controls it centrally, so you can achieve a consistent print-ready report layout in no time at all.
Referents: Nicole Tödtmann and Thomas Lohrengel
Go live in 4 days - IFRS 16 with the GlobalLeaseCenter
With the GlobalLeaseCenter you can implement a tested and regularly maintained IFRS 16 leasing tool in record time. The GlobalLeaseCenter is a comfortable standard solution of AMANA to effectively and efficiently account for leasing matters according to IFRS 16. Within a clear and well-structured process the GlobalLeaseCenter supports the user in data collection. Validations of the input data increase the data quality. Based on the entered contract data, the GlobalLeaseCenter intelligently recognises which IFRS 16 facts are present (new contract, modification; reassessment) and automatically carries out their evaluation. The generation of bookings, dicslosures and reports at company level or group level is one of the standard functionalities of our IFRS 16 system. More than just a software solution: our experienced consulting team will accompany and support you both in the project and, if required, in live operation.
Referents: Eva-Maria Kuhlmann and Baris Cabuk
ESEF text block tagging - Lessons Learned
According to the new ESEF Regulation, the tagging scope for the preparation of ESEF annual reports ending after 01.01.2022 has been significantly increased. The full notes to the financial statements have to be tagged with text block taggings, additionally to the main financial statements, which is a new challenge for preparers and audit firms.
In our webinar, the experiences from the first year of ESEF implementation will be presented, especially regarding text block tagging. In addition to the technical requirements, we will also discuss practical examples of our intelligent software solution SmartNotes.
Referents: Nina Schüller and Philipp Stampfuß
ESG Reporting with AMANA: Automated Data Flow and integrated XBRL Tagging
The current European Sustainability Reporting Standard (ESRS) exposure draft, as published by EFRAG defines 178 sector-agnostic disclosure requirements, sector specific disclosure requirements are not yet defined. Those disclosure requirements describe hundreds of single data points and narrative disclosures that must reported in a human-readable report, as well as in a digital and machine-readable format. It includes data points on water and energy consumption, Greenhouse Gas emissions, pollution, biodiversity as well as many social aspects like disclosures on workforce. Policies, targets, and specific action plans will have to be reported in order to see how companies are going to face the challenges of a changing world and climate change.
In our webinar, we are going to summarize the challenges regarding the actual reporting and publication process, which includes:
• How to calculate, collect and consolidate the required data points by using solutions from AMANA partners.
• Using disclosure management software to be able to work collaboratively on the sustainability statements.
• Automate the data flow from various sources into management reports in order to eliminate manual and error-prone process as well as to optimize the last-mile reporting process.
• Options how to handle formatting and the production of glossy and ready-to-print reports in Word or InDesign as well as online reports.
• Digital tagging of sustainability and financial statements with the ESRS or ISSB XBRL taxonomy.
• Auditing and publication of the final report.
Referents: Richard Bössen and Philipp Stampfuss
How to create an ESEF reporting in no time - Plug & Play with the AMANA XBRL Tagger
In our webinar, we will present our solution outlining the simple handling of report production and the automated tagging support feature based on artificial intelligence (AI) developed by AMANA, which significantly simplifies the creation of ESEF reports.
Referents: Nina Schüller and Janis Steinmann