In 2019, Discover Financial Services, the third-largest credit card brand in the United States, was running seven highly customized on-premises ERP systems. Their IT landscape was complex and lacked standardization, which resulted in slow and sometimes inaccurate reporting. Moreover, the accounting team and their counterparts in financial analysis and planning needed more scalable systems to support their growing workloads. After evaluating several vendors, Discover chose to simplify its environment by consolidating systems on Oracle Fusion Cloud ERP, integrated with Oracle Fusion Cloud Enterprise Performance Management (EPM).
The project team had a clear vision: The ERP implementation was more than an IT upgrade. It was an opportunity to create and sustain business value companywide, generating “more data and higher quality,” says vice president, business technology: strategy, transformation, and governance. “Ultimately, the functionality and automation help us make more effective enterprise-wide decisions.”
This vision helped Discover complete the ERP implementation on time and on budget, despite working remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic. “There are two things I look for in an implementation,” says Vice President. “The first is when people say the implementation was a nonevent. The second is when people start giving unsolicited feedback that they’re loving the systems. On day 15, post go-live, we heard both.”
The modernized ERP platform has paid off. With faster access to financial information, Discover employees companywide can more effectively manage expenses. Lines of business enjoy more accurate planning projections and cost analysis. With standardized functionality replacing customization, employees spend less time deciphering technology and more time achieving results. And with quarterly cloud functionality updates delivered automatically, Discover can continue to enhance its processes and ways of working.
