Company Background

DHL is the global market leader of the international express and logistics industry. DHL offers expertise in express, air and ocean freight, overland transport, and contract logistic solutions. DHL's international network links more than 225 countries and territories worldwide. Some 300,000 employees, including more than 40,000 employees in the U.S., are dedicated to providing fast and reliable services. Founded in San Francisco in 1969, DHL is a Deutsche Post World Net brand.

Project Goals & Objectives

  • Replace antiquated, inefficient planning system in less than two month
  • Deploy new planning solution, expanding usage from 40 people to 600+
  • Build system to accommodate DHL’s changing needs and growth

Business Issues

Due to its size and scope, DHL faced many challenges related to its planning and budgeting processes. The existing system was antiquated, lacked stability, and created process inefficiencies. To complicate matters, DHL had recently acquired Airborne Express, bringing about new data sources and an SAP implementation, which drained finance resources.

In addition, DHL was in the process of relocating its California corporate headquarters to Florida, which resulted in loss of some subject matter experts. DHL also wanted to deploy a new planning solution that went beyond the corporate finance group to facilitate a true bottom-up budgeting process, which would expand the planning community from 40 employees to more than 600.

Ranzal Role

Only two months away from annual budgeting and lacking a reliable planning system, DHL partnered with Ranzal. The Ranzal project team set a plan in motion utilizing advanced implementation skills and Hyperion technologies to deliver a high quality planning solution capable of accommodating DHL’s changing needs within the company’s rigid deadline.

Ranzal focused on developing a tool for the annual budgeting process and providing a foundation for long-term enhancements to budgeting and forecasting processes. The near-term strategy included expense and capital planning, rollout to approximately 60 users, and the introduction of advanced reporting and analytical tools.

Within seven weeks, Ranzal completed a new planning application and delivered it for user acceptance testing. Forty-five days thereafter, the business community signed-off on the system functionality and approved the plan for rollout. One week thereafter, approximately 30 users were trained and ready to begin the budgeting process, followed by an additional 30 users with the next few weeks.

Business Benefits

  • Greater efficiency and time savings with new planning and reporting process
  • Ability to meet goal of expanding planning community to 600 employees
  • Ability to support changing business environment with flexible, web-based solution