The Impact of Business Intelligence on Financial Reporting Accuracy and Internal controls

Ing. Ereny Awadalla

Master's thesis

Abstract:

In this thesis, I am examining the impact of the transition from legacy tools to modern business intelligence (BI) tools, focusing on Talaat Moustafa Group Holding (TMGH), which is one of Egypt's leading real estate corporations. I am examining TMGH's challenges such as data integration, time efficiency and error minimization in financial reporting and reconciliation processes when SAP BusinessObjects and Microsoft Excel were used in comparison to the modern BI tools which are Power BI and Power Query. TMGH’s legacy tools provide basic capabilities but are limited to the manual processes, high error exposure, and inadequate handling of the organization’s massive data volumes, which include over 15 million customer accounts and 20 terabytes of financial logs. By shifting to Power BI and Power Query, TMGH achieves automation, advanced data modelling, and interactive visualizations, simplifying report preparation and reconciliation processes. The case study examines specific reports and reconciliations, including daily sales performance and monthly sales trends. Tasks that require up to 6 hours in SAP BO reduce to less than 3 hours with Power BI, because of the automation and data integration features. Likewise, Excel-based reconciliations for revenue recognition, which previously depended on manual contract analysis and calculations, now benefit from automated workflows that integrate data from contracts, ledgers, and performance metrics through Power Query, thereby reducing manual data entry and accelerating discrepancy resolution.

Abstract:

In this thesis, I am examining the impact of the transition from legacy tools to modern business intelligence (BI) tools, focusing on Talaat Moustafa Group Holding (TMGH), which is one of Egypt's leading real estate corporations. I am examining TMGH's challenges such as data integration, time efficiency and error minimization in financial reporting and reconciliation processes when SAP BusinessObjects and Microsoft Excel were used in comparison to the modern BI tools which are Power BI and Power Query. TMGH’s legacy tools provide basic capabilities but are limited to the manual processes, high error exposure, and inadequate handling of the organization’s massive data volumes, which include over 15 million customer accounts and 20 terabytes of financial logs. By shifting to Power BI and Power Query, TMGH achieves automation, advanced data modelling, and interactive visualizations, simplifying report preparation and reconciliation processes. The case study examines specific reports and reconciliations, including daily sales performance and monthly sales trends. Tasks that require up to 6 hours in SAP BO reduce to less than 3 hours with Power BI, because of the automation and data integration features. Likewise, Excel-based reconciliations for revenue recognition, which previously depended on manual contract analysis and calculations, now benefit from automated workflows that integrate data from contracts, ledgers, and performance metrics through Power Query, thereby reducing manual data entry and accelerating discrepancy resolution.

Keywords

Business intelligence, Financial reporting, Internal controls, Microsoft excel, SAP Business Objects, Power Query, Power BI

Language used: English

Date on which the thesis was submitted / produced: 3. 1. 2025

Thesis defence

• Date of defence: 28. 1. 2025
• Supervisor: Ing. Oleksandra Lemeshko
• Reader: Ing. Bc. Jana Hvozdenská, Ph.D.

Masaryk University

Faculty of Economics and Administration

Master programme / field:
Finance / Finance