IDU and Draftworx team up

IDU, the corporate performance management (CPM) software company that transforms the budgeting, forecasting and reporting process for medium and large businesses, has partnered with Draftworx, which provides tools to automate and remove the complexity of International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) financial statements, to close the loop for clients every month.

The commonalities and synergies between the two companies are remarkable. IDU offers an easy-to-use, yet enterprise-grade budgeting tool that Gartner has named as one of the top financial planning applications for the last two years and G2 Crowd has ranked in the top three global solutions for 2019. Draftworx is the first browser-based IFRS financial reporting tool in the world. Both are successful South African-founded accountancy technology companies and are owner-founder managed, with highly skilled financial teams. Both companies set out to simplify and streamline onerous yet essential accountancy tasks, freeing up accountants and auditors to do more interesting, strategically valuable work for their clients and companies.

IDU has integrated Draftworx service into its idu-Concept platform, so that at the press of a button, clients can automatically generate up to 80% of the data they need for their IFRS and eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) reports, ready for importing into Draftworx. This will expose IDU’s corporate client base, typically mid to enterprise companies across all industry sectors, to Draftworx’s capabilities. Conversely, Draftworx will introduce IDU’s expertise and services to both corporate and practice clients.

“We’ve always been single-minded about doing one thing very well: making the budgeting, forecasting and reporting process less onerous, faster, more collaborative and more accurate,” said Kevin Phillips, IDU co-founder and CEO. “So in response to customer requirements, especially in light of the updated rulings around XBRL submission to the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC) in South Africa, and anticipating increased regulatory demand into the future, it makes perfect sense to partner with Draftworx, a trusted provider that we work with very well, for a comprehensive service for our respective clients.”

As well as XBRL submissions, Draftworx also supports accountants with meeting increasing IFRS requirements. It has created specific templates for various unique requirements in several countries, and is rolling out additional templates to meet demand. In addition, Draftworx is developing a US GAAP template, which dovetails perfectly with IDU’s recent announcement of its expansion into the Americas market.

“IDU takes care of the monthly budgets, forecasts and reporting, managing information from exco down and through the organisation; while we look after the annual financial side and help our customers meet their respective statutory obligations, managing information from exco up and outside the organisation,” said Earl Steyn, Draftworx founder and director. “This integration and partnership means that all of a company’s reporting is taken care of, in a smarter way.”

The partnership was announced at the 10^th Annual IDU User Conference, held in Cape Town, South Africa at the end of February 2019. Financial managers, accountants and administrators, plus IT managers from a range of industries and countries came together to discuss how responsive and collaborative budgeting, and real-time access to the numbers can help companies adapt quickly to constant and rapid change. 

About IDU

IDU, idusoft.com, makes budgeting, forecasting, performance management and reporting tools to simplify financial management. Our flagship product, idu-Concept, provides easy, effective budgeting and financial reporting for medium-sized to large businesses. It is the most widely deployed dedicated budgeting system in South Africa with an ever increasing global footprint. idu-Concept integrates easily with ERP software, but unlike more cumbersome offerings, idu-Concept can be implemented quickly, requires little or no ongoing consulting fees and reduces budgeting cycles from months to weeks. idu-Concept, available on premise, as a hosted solution or in the cloud, addresses this establishing a platform of ownership and empowerment that inevitably leads to radical improvement in the effective management control of every business. IDU is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.

About Draftworx

Draftworx™, www.draftworx.com, is a fully integrated, compliant, automated drafting and working paper suite designed to alleviate problems identified in current drafting, working paper and audit software. It’s the result of collaboration with some of the world’s greatest accounting & auditing minds. The solution includes financial statements, XBRL reporting, working papers, audit methodologies, collaboration tools and digital signatures in an affordable desktop, cloud and hybrid variant.