The Scenario Room: Reforecast the Gulf in Real Time

Michael Tyc

00:19 - 11:18

Hello. Welcome to the scenario room.

Today in this webinar, we will talk about how OneStream can be the one extensible platform for the Office of Finance to model every scenario for every industry. My name is Miral Ocic.

I'm a solutions consulting director based out of The Netherlands, and I'm joined today by Mohammed Zakaria Sekershort, who's our senior solution consultant based out of Dubai. What we'll be doing today is we're going to take a step back and set the scene for just a minute to give a bit of understanding of why we are here today.

We'll then introduce the One Tring platform and then have a look at how AI can support your your day to day activities and struggles when it comes down to actually being able to keep up in the world of scenario modeling. And finally, but not the least, we're going to wrap up with Zach demonstrating the OneStream platform.

The reality is is that based on macroeconomic and geopolitical events that we see and hear about on a weekly or even daily basis impact every single plan that you had, whether it was last year's plan for the budget of this year, whether it's the plan for the end of the year that you're currently running, or whether it's the five year outlook or even longer that you have set out from strategic perspective. Everything that happens in the world affects something directly or indirectly.

And that comes then with a lot of challenges, whether it's, you know, being able to model out if multicurrency exposure is applicable or if. What if currency is affected when commodities swing.

All of these ripple through every single forecast and outlook that you put out there. The second that anything happens, these manual forecasts basically cannot keep up with the speed of the business because we already know that a regular forecasting, forecasting process or a budget can take weeks, if not months, to complete at a first.

So imagine having to change these individual drivers to basically come up with a new forecast or a new scenario. On top of that, right now, the pressure is very, very high to look at AI.

Everyone has AI. Everyone has invested in AI or is about to invest in AI.

But are you actually trusting AI to work with your financial data? So the problem isn't really being able to access AI because you can. The question is, how can I actually trust it so that I'm able to audit and have it, access my financial data in a governed way, in a way that actually we know that the system and AI understands what we do in finance? So, ultimately, what we want to be able to do and what you want to be able to do is to be able to basically change a simple assumption or a simple driver or a fundamental driver that's relevant for your business.

With a flick of a button, watch the whole outlook move with it. Whether it's, again, the forecast of the budget or the five year strategy, you should be able to change and tweak the drivers that are relevant at that moment without having to undergo the whole manual process that we just described.

So one stream has basically the ability to provide the granularity in the way that you need it for your business. So for the session today, we've picked a couple of these industries that we know are crucial inside of the region.

And when we, for example, look at hospitality or tourism, in general, they were talking about a completely different level of detail and different drivers that are relevant for that business. You're talking about properties.

You're talking about hotels as where manufacturing plants are crucial for the manufacturing industry, obviously. So that context by industry is absolutely crucial so that you get the drivers and the metrics and the dimensionality that actually fits your individual organization.

And as such, then be able to create an unlimited number of different scenarios literally by taking them, tweaking them, and comparing them in that one single unified workspace. And that is where OneStream comes into play.

We are the single unified platform that supports all the backward looking and forward looking processes all in a unified data model, which basically is flexible enough and is basically allowing you to create those types of detail based on the process, based on the industry, based on the segment, all in that one single place. And we do that in a unique way.

And on top of that, we have fully integrated the AI capabilities, whether it's from a planning perspective moving forward or whether it's from an analytical perspective looking backwards. And Zach is going to touch on those in the demonstration.

That means that the the system and the platform can connect to any kind of data source that is relevant for your specific use cases to really get the context that you need to support these processes and apply AI onto it. And on the top of this picture, you see on the top right how AI is not only used inside of the system, but actually also works together with third party vendors so that we're able to support a full scale of reporting analytics capabilities.

Also, that part will be part of the demonstration by Zach. So modeling industry specifics basically means to be able to think about what is relevant for a specific industry.

So when we talk about hospitality and demonstration, you'll see them come through. We are looking at revenue per available room, the occupancy rate, and food and beverage, the costs that basically move with the commodity and the weather swings.

So completely different driving, very specific drivers to that industry. Now when we look at a different industry within the same environment, for example, the oil and gas, industry, we are talking about, you know, the the realized prices that are that are linked to the brand pricing or freight and logistic expenses or royalties or field utilizations.

All very, very sensitive to the macroeconomics that we are. That we introduced in the beginning and and obviously then are crucial to track throughout the process of planning and analytics.

And what if you actually are a holding company? So what if you have multiple industries that you support? This is where the unified data model that we pictured in the big circle comes into play. So then one single unified data model allows you to actually look at it from a corporate holding perspective, at a consolidated level where you set out your your targets, your strategic goals without diving into those details, but being able to directly connect to the business and basically push those targets and push those numbers down to your individual businesses with their own business context built into the data model.

So again, a hospitality division and a manufacturing division or or the gas division will have access to the drivers and the relevant KPIs that they need on a day to day business without disturbing each other and without overloading and overburdening the whole system as a. From a group's perspective.

And then once that data is in, then on the right hand side, you can work on every scenario, whether it's setting out a baseline, then create a positive outlook or a negative outlook or all the variance in between all with a press of a button. In the demonstration, we'll see an example on how easy that could actually be.

And, ultimately, bringing all these things together allows leadership to basically get access to an analytical layer to basically analyze the numbers and make decisions way, way faster, not after the actuals already, you know, gained up on the on the forecast. So where does the AI come into play? We've named this Sensible AI, and we did that for a reason.

Because AI needs to be trustworthy, and we need to understand what AI has done. So So in the demonstration, what we'll showcase is how we can move from what actually happens in terms of figuring out where the naming numbers came from and what happened in the background to actually understanding why they have this, to get access to the underlying data and actually understand root causes in a matter of seconds.

So before, you have to do it in a manual way. You know, we are looking at consolidated numbers.

There's a variance of actuals that are trailing the budget, so we don't really know what's happened. Then we do dig into the numbers, whether it's, an hour's worth of spending time in Excel sheets or drilling into source systems, figuring out what actually happened.

What we are proposing here is that, actually, that is where AI comes into play. Having access to the governed layer of data and then ask the agent the question to actually figure out what happened, and not only once, but actually on a recurring basis, and not only on a monthly basis, but actually on a weekly or daily basis if you if you really desire.

So that means that before actually going to meetings where we're trying to figure out what happened, we already know because the system has analyzed it for you. So that's from a backward looking perspective.

So what if we know what the crucial KPIs are for our specific industry? What if we know that we have to set out certain, goals based on positive outlooks, negative outlooks? But what if we need to do that at a scale that the human cannot really understand? Because, again, imagine that all these business specific drivers happen across hundreds or thousands of locations or hundreds or thousands of products. Now that is where AI can elevate your forecasting and your planning.

So looking in. At the.

What we call, sensible AI forecasting models, they will help you generate forecasts in a matter of minutes at a high scale based on what happened in the past plus what is relevant to your business when it comes down to events, occurrences that basically allow you to base. Tailor the forecast and be as accurate as possible.

In a demonstration circle, basically showcase a couple of examples specific to an industry to get get that understanding on how AI not only generates that forecast, but actually explains how it got to that number and actually explains how important certain drivers and certain aspects of what happens in the world, how relevant they actually are. And that is where I hand over to Zach for the demonstration.

Mohammad Zakaria

11:18 - 32:15

Thank you, Tyc. So allow me to share the screen from my side to start our demonstration for today's webinar.

So now you are seeing my screen. So allow me to take you through today's demonstration and, show how exactly one stream platform are going to cater down all of the requirements of the scenario room.

So as you saw from the slides that Techo presented briefly that we are today's in the current geopolitical situation, and the ongoing instance in the in the region that I would like to have a very agile platform to absorb all of the changes that's happening on a weekly basis, even in a daily basis, and allows me to have multiple scenarios and assess and see the impact on my business and just keep updating my forecast as needed. And as you can see from the landing page, so, every single screen that we are going to see today is 100% configurable based on your needs and based on your requirements.

So this is how exactly we're going to personalize our demonstration, our user navigation based on a persona based. So once I look to the platform, I will be able to see the most important KPIs and financial wishes, which is belong to me and focus only on my part of the business or my part of the industry that I'm responsible for if we are working in a holding company.

So let's go together and see the strategic planning. As you can see from the top, I can have a multiple navigation tabs, which just takes me to the different parts of the business that I have an access to based on my security profile.

So the strategic planning. So today, as we having a lot of changes that's happening in the region, I will be able to.

Or I would like to have a very practical way and dynamic way to start define and change and do the updates of the business drivers that is matching my business. So as you can see from the screen, so this is an example for the oil and gas, which is, it's impacted, significantly with the current geopolitical situation in the region.

So instead of keep updating the important drivers impacting my business on a multiple spreadsheets or Excel files and keep copy paste this data, which is gonna be disconnected process, and I need to have all of this is weaved in in one single platform. And this is where OneStreams comes to the picture.

So OneStreams allow you to have a very dynamic way to have all of these drivers in one single place, and they'll be able to have it across multiple industries or multiple line of business or business units as it's needed. So as you can see, now we are talking about the oil and gas.

So we'll be able to see all of the drivers belong to the production volume for the, operating expenses, to the royalty, and so on and so forth. So this is.

Can give me an access to a multiple scenario. So I can have a multiple scenarios, and we don't have any limitation how many scenarios that's required to be have or to be built in the solution.

And as well, I would be able to move across a different line of business as I need it. And as you can see, I would be able to have it for more granularity as needed.

So now we are doing the forecasting or the planning for the upcoming year. So what if I need to keep the granularity level for the upcoming twenty twenty seven year for a monthly basis? But after that, for the year after, I need to have it on a quarterly basis and moving forward to have it on, let's say, on an annual basis.

And this has give me, let's say, the business plan or the strategic plan for the upcoming five years. And I will be able to update these figures on the fly as, cell by cell as, as needed, or even I would be able to highlight multiple, let's say, humans, I would be able to use this breeding functionality, which just takes me to a lot of ways to do the update and modify of my drivers.

I'll be able to use multiple spreading types over here. And once I save all of this, it's going to take care and just do the calculation for the whole model.

So the whole model are all connected together. And if we look to the bottom of the screen, this has give me a quick view on the key metrics by the different scenarios.

So as we saw on the top, I would be able to compare different scenarios that I have based on the ongoing actions on the region. So I can have upside scenario.

I can have a downside scenario. I can have a predictive scenario.

I mean, best case scenario, worst case scenario, and so on. So this just takes me to the most important factors over here by different scenarios.

On the right hand side, I'll be able to see this from visual based on side on a chart, which is definitely. You'll be able to change the chart types.

In addition, you will be able to see the variance between these different scenarios that I have across the multiple years that I have in my plan. So I can have it for two or three years down the road, even ten years down the road.

So it depends on the industry you are, dealing with. So all of this is able to be selected.

As you can see, I will be able to see the baseline from years to another, and you'll be able to see the comparisons as is needed once I move to that. Even I will be able to visualize and consume all of these, scenarios on a monthly basis as needed or keep changing between a year to another.

So this is a weave in between all of these different scenarios, different years, and all of it linked to the the the drivers which is belong to my specific industry. As well, I would be able to have a multiple, I would say, features or multiple functions over here.

So for example, I would be able to copy these scenarios between different scenarios. So let's say from what if scenario one to two, etcetera.

So all of this is to be able to copy all of this and simulate what's happening in my industry, what's happening in my region so I can have, quick prompt actions on what's happening. And all of these from one single place, one platform, and all of these changes that's happening on my data, in a cell level, all of it is a full audit trail.

So I'll be able to understand what was the previous number, what was the new updated, who changed it, what, and what was the old value as well. So the whole platform having a full order trade capability enabled by by a.

By standard functionality. So this was a very quick example on the strategic plan on, I would say, the traditional way doing the strategic planning.

However, what if I would like to utilize the embedded AI and the platform? So let's go together and visualize this on a two different industries. So the first one is gonna be the hospitality.

So what if I would like to have more advanced statistical way to control and change a multiple drivers, which is features over here? So based on the AI model insight in front of us, which is allow me to reflect what exactly the changes that's happening in the market, in my industry. So for example, over here in the hospitality, which is impacted, with the current situation in the region, I would be able to review my regions if I'm operating in multiple regions, if I have multiple properties, different results, different hotel hotel chain under my command.

So this is. All of it would be over here in the model, and they can assess exactly the forecast and compare my baseline with the prediction intervals over here.

And all of this is. Are going to be in.

Showing with the different features or events that I have in the market. And the platform allow me to have a different features or events per industry.

So as we're talking about the, about the hospitality, I would be able to expedite and just open the chances the chances that I have of my business with a different driver. So for example, I would be able to link this to my, let's say, a tourism index.

I would be able to see this with my utilization, my average daily room rates across my business. And they can see it even on a monthly basis, weekly basis, or even a daily basis that as I go through, through the analysis.

And the model as well will be able to cater and having in place any other internal events or internal features that belong to my country base or my, my my company or my subsidiary. And in addition, we have here the embedded generative AI, which is allow me to provide an explanation and give me what exactly these graphs mean and how exactly the feature or events impacting my business by increase or by decrease and how exactly this is.

Takes my revenue forward as it's needed. In addition, I would be able to see the toggle four charts over here.

So the tug of war charts, which is. Show me the impact of my features on my performance.

So this is gonna give me the full visibility for my, let's say, for my, period. And as well, I would be able to just focus and narrow it down on a very specific days of my weeks, of my month, and see what exactly was the top positive features impacting my performance and what exactly was the top negative five features that's taking down my performance down so I can see how exactly the accuracy of my prediction and what was the base of my prediction moving forward in addition definitely to a lot of hours and, analysis out of the model.

And this was for the hospitality. So let's see what if I have a retail business.

So if we are a conglomerate, having oil and gas business, having hospitality, having a retail, which is we need to focus that the mobile is dynamic, which is give the flexibility for each line of business through the extensive dimensionality features of OneStream. So each business would be able to see and analyze their business through their dimensions, their own specific drivers, their own specific features, which is impacting their part of the business without jeopardizing to be on a very high level so I can, I can centralize more analysis of my prediction or forecast across this business? So as we saw previously on the hospitality, sir, now we're having a retail.

I can have my business working in a different types of the retail business, electronics, apparel, grocery, etcetera. I would be able to review this by by region, by country, by category, and as well see the assess from the features over here.

And a few notes of that, I would be able to see this from the retail business drivers, which is impacting their business as the electronics, like the tourism index, which is impacting the retail industry for my specific country or region that I'm working for. If I have a specific events, like now we are in September, so we're having the back to school events, which is increase the purchase that I have in the retail business.

And as well, for the tug of war, I would be able to narrow it down and see what exactly the most important top positive and negative features impacting my, my business. So the last point or the last, Marush, is gonna be the financial reporting.

So as we moved from the strategic planning to the different industries that I have under my command to see the financial reporting. So as the analytics port is an embedded functionality in the platform, so all of these changes are going to be weave together and linked together.

So I don't need to move data or metadata between a different isolated balance, all of it in one single application, one single model within one stream. So the financial reporting give the ability for the self-service reports to empower our business users.

So I will be able to select from a different entities that I have access or control on it. I'll be able to review a different kind of statements and different types of it.

So now I'm seeing the variance review actions, which is give me the exact actual connectivity to my back end systems and back end sources. I'll be able to view my budget and even the prior years analysis.

So let's see and focus on the forecasting. As you can see from the drop down drop down menu, I'll be able to review multiple types on a monthly basis, quarterly basis, and forecasting.

So let's see how exactly my forecast development analysis will help me to understand what was exactly the performance happened in the prior year as you can see from my income statement. So this is reading from the prior year.

And now we have the budget final version, which is we concluded when we finalized our budget last year. And now we are starting the year.

So as you can see that the budget finally. So we finalized this budget at the end of the previous financial year.

So this is. I can't count on it while driving and steering my business under the going situation and changes that's happening.

So this was a snapshot last year. So this just takes me to the upcoming forecasting methodology.

So now we can having the forecasting three plus nine period, forecasting six plus six. So I would be able to see how exactly during the year and during my execution, I need to do the analysis and take any corrective actions as I go.

So all of this is. Are connected together, and all of these model are connected together and see the performance and allows me to do the analysis to understand what happened exactly during the business.

So, for example, over here, if we need to focus, for example, on the total operating expenses. So the budget last year, which is approved, was 125.

But during the period, for the first three period, I would be able to see that I got increase in my total operating expenses. So this is a three plus nine.

So this has given me the ability to see how exactly I would be able to reduce the operating expenses so I would be able to increase my net income as I go at the end of the year. So this is the forecasting six by six.

And all of these numbers, I would be able to do the required analysis by right click and drill down capabilities to take me to the lowest level of details that is possible to give me the full understanding of that, of that analysis and the changes that's happening. So it's not a black box.

I would be able to track down every single cell of what exactly impacted the business. As we can see over here, the main reason behind all of the changes was the marketing advertising over here, which has been increased.

So this has increased my. The total Opex as, as you go.

So till now, we're seeing the summary level. So what if I need to go to the lowest level to see a full analysis of the current situation of the forecast development, I will be able to click on the detail, and the model are going to be.

Expand to reflect all of the income statement, which is belong only to my current subsidiary and this current entity. So this is, again, confirming the idea of the extensive dimensionality that every single part of my business would be able to see and doing the analysis and develop their forecast based on their, their needs and the way they are doing the business.

So so far, we are utilizing all of this from, the reporting and the analysis part. So as long as the platform having the AI agents.

So if I click over here on the top side of the screen, this just takes me to the agents, which is an embedded financial agents, which is allow me to take my analysis to the next level. As you can see, we have many AI agents is embedded in the solution, allow me to do and go and provide all of the required analysis.

So. Which is take my regular standard language of the questions.

So now we can ask the solution or ask the agents why exactly the total operating expenses increased for the specific period for the specific subsidiary and run it, and the agents are going to go and do the required analysis and get me back with the full details. And here, this has saved a lot of time and give me a more accuracy as well of my analysis.

So instead of go and just to drill down and trying to find right and left the different parts of the analysis and running a multiple reports to understand why my total OPEX for that specific period has been impacted. So now the agent are going to be run and just give me the results and the analysis as needed.

Now after a few seconds, I can see the finest analysis. AI agent came back with the results and telling me what exactly the main reason that's deriving my operating expenses in a different ways.

So over here, I would be able to understand and even analysis and open the reports which is showing me why was the main reason that I have all of these operating expenses and increase because of the marketing and advertising, increased by. At that specific, amount, which has impacted my total, operating expenses as needed.

And it's not a black box. The agent just take you to all of the think way how exactly they reach and how exactly they approach the analysis.

So I'll be able to go and just click on any number of these and open the analysis behind, the numbers. So these agents are embedded in the solution.

And as well, if you have any other agents like Claude, like ChargeGBT, Copilot, you would be able to use the integration between one stream through the MCP with these different agents. So if you have Claude and just came here and just ask the same question, as you can see.

So Claude will go and just connect to the same single source of truth and the trusted data and govern data within one stream and provide you with the required answers and the required analysis based on the integration with OneStream. So all of the previous data, trusted workflow, approved, all of the analysis which has been conducted on OneStream platform are going to be connected and just have to provide all of the required analysis on your, AI agents and, or the cloud, for example, or that you're using for a few.

So this is to summarize that you would be able to adapt and absorb all of the changes that's happening in the current situation in the Middle East region and just adapt all of these different drivers, all of these different changes in the business, in the region, and see the direct impact on your data and enable you and empower you with the, required governance and required trust of the data and the embedded AI capabilities within the platform to have a different scenarios, and this is. Takes a.

Takes us back to the scenario room concept. Thank you.

So I'll pause here and just back to you, Tish. Thank you.

Michael Tyc

32:15 - 33:44

Thank you, Zach. Thank you for the presentation.

In the meantime, there was a question that came, through through the chat. And the question was basically how OneStream is different from other solutions and vendors out there.

And the short answer there is this was what OneStream was meant to do from the very first day that it got created. So it is architected to be as flexible as to any type of business in any type of industry of any type of size so that not only can they look at their numbers, from whatever they cannot.

That they cannot, influence anymore looking backwards, but actually be able to support decision making properly. And that means getting access to those drivers and those KPIs that are relevant for the business at whatever the scale is.

And so that was basically the purpose, with which OneStream was built from that one single data model. No longer no longer do we have to reconcile multiple systems.

That one single system needs to be able to cater for all of these use cases. That is all the time that we have.

So our purpose for today was to provide you insights in how OneStream supports every industry just to play, basically, model out and plan for every scenario in one extensible platform. We hope you enjoyed the webinar.

Thank you for your attendance, and we'll see you on the next one. Thank you.

Mohammad Zakaria

33:44 - 33:45

Thank you.