[South Africa] Aspen Pharmacare achieves global first in tax transparency with Oracle Tax Reporting Cloud

In a first of its kind implementation, Aspen Pharmacare Holdings Limited (“Aspen”), the largest pharmaceutical company listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange has selected the Oracle Tax Reporting Cloud solution to report tax timely and accurately in order to be compliant with the Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (“BEPS”) Country by Country reporting.

Implemented in collaboration with Accenture, the Oracle Tax Reporting Cloud solution will deliver a bespoke functionality tailored to Aspen’s specific requirements including effective governance; functionality; cost-savings and reporting capabilities for more than 190 users.

In line with BEPS reporting requirements, the newly implemented integrated cloud solution also allowed Aspen to complete all data reporting and collection within a few weeks as against more than eight months with a manual process. This swift implementation helped Aspen avoid significant tax penalties and Full Time Equivalent (FTE) costs that would arise from late submissions and inaccurate reporting; all while working seamlessly with existing systems.

“Ensuring complete transparency between the tax and finance functions to enable accurate reporting of the company’s performance to regulators and other stakeholders is a key priority for us”, says Brenda Engelbrecht, Group Tax Executive, Aspen. “The Oracle Tax Reporting Cloud solution offered a seamless approach to achieve these objectives besides also helping reduce costs with automation. We are confident about this implementation and are keen on exploring all its benefits.”

“The Oracle Tax Reporting Cloud is designed to connect the processes, data and metadata that tax and finance functions share, while also providing customizable functionalities that can be tailored to customer specifications”, said Derek Bose, Senior Applications Director, Southern Africa, Oracle. “Together with Accenture, we have now delivered an innovative cloud solution that will allow Aspen develop a highly automated and transparent tax function.” 

www.aspenpharma.com