Simply smarter systems fuel healthy growth

An exciting union took place, especially for health-conscious, loyal customers of two well-known brands, Atkins® and Quest®. While the company merged, now called Simply Good Foods, leadership wanted to meld behind behind-the-scenes operations but maintain the two brands, separately. This meant standardizing business operations, formalizing consistent data, increasing the productivity of third-party logistics (3PL), and improving order management speed-to-delivery.

As Quest had recently completed an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) upgrade, Simply Good Foods’ leadership decided to implement the Microsoft Dynamics 365 (D365) Finance and Supply Chain Management platform across the Atkins brand as well. A merger, new software, operations standardization—all at the same time. It was time to add KPMG to the recipe.

Simply Good Foods turned to KPMG to leverage our extensive experience in Microsoft implementations and the KPMG Powered Enterprise methodology. Guided by leading practices and fueled by cloud-enabled technology along with a target operating model, this approach delivers speed-to-value for business transformations.

From the beginning of the yearlong project we made a point of creating a “one-team” atmosphere; we knew that it would be beneficial for the two merging brands to help close any technological gaps based on the overall entity’s strategic roadmap and growth plans.

Based on the data integration framework of the D365 platform and leveraging Powered Enterprise the KPMG team helped our client navigate a complex transformation with several large workstreams including automating sales and procurement transactions, introducing EDI processes for order management, financial consolidation, trade promotions, and change management. The new data and analytics capabilities provide consolidated reporting which facilitates proactive decision-making, so that our client can take advantage of its data for years to come.

Microsoft and KPMG worked together to help position Simply Good Foods for continued transformation, growth, and efficiently on boarding future mergers and acquisitions.

Thanks to the smooth adoption of D365 and standardized processes across both companies, our client came out of the merger with not only a one-company focus, but also a multibranded business model. This approach enables it to:

• analyze brand data at a granular level while showing a unified face to the customer
• take advantage of key Microsoft apps—such as Power BI for financial reports and Power Apps to create sales orders and manage contracts—to transform and simplify its business while improving overall company and employee productivity
• gain on going access to timely new functionality— such as lease accounting capabilities—because of Microsoft’s annual $5 billion investment in the D365 platform
• balance central control and local flexibility with robust governance and standardization
• increase productivity with 3PL for customer and vendor order management by introducing automated EDI capabilities, increasing the speed from order to delivery, and improving customer satisfaction.

A responsive global team

Clients want advisors with deep understanding of their chosen technology solutions. KPMG drew upon a decades-long, global partnership with Microsoft that includes specialized practice groups for the company’s Azure, Dynamics, and Office 365 cloud platforms; thousands of Microsoft-certified professionals; and hundreds of successful digital collaborations in almost every sector and business function.

Decisive leaders want to move quickly

The KPMG Powered Enterprise approach is explicitly designed to generate rapid, measurable results. It distills our experience and insight into prebuilt components, so clients can leapfrog generic issues and move confidently toward their objectives from day one.