Virgin goes live with latest CODA-Financials solution to ensure euro compatibility

CODA plc, a leading global provider of financial intelligence, accounting and procurement solutions, has announced that leading entertainment retailer Virgin Megastores has gone live with the latest, Internet-architected version of the CODA-Financials global accounting solution. CODA's euro-compliant retail financial solution ensures that Virgin Megastores can trade and deliver retail sales analysis in the euro. CODA-Financials will provide Virgin with comprehensive reporting and analysis capabilities, giving the company greater real-time visibility of finances across its 94 Megastores throughout the UK and Ireland.

Virgin, which had previous experience of CODA's proprietary IBM AS/400 (iSeries)-based solution, selected CODA ahead of JD Edwards primarily because of its cost-effectiveness. Also key to the deal was CODA-Retail, the retail finance solution offering full integration with the specialist EPoS and merchandising systems at the Virgin Megastores HQ. This enables staff to produce timely trading summaries and detailed sales reports. The CODA solution of CODA-Financials and CODA-Retail provides Virgin with centralised financial management information in real-time, as well as giving Virgin Megastores staff in the UK and Ireland access to crucial sales information on all the company's stock items.

"Entertainment retail is a fast-moving sector and with sales of individual stocklines changing from day to day, it is imperative that each store is kept up-to-date with trading information," said Robert Leaning, Financial Systems Development Manager, Virgin Megastores. "The implementation of CODA-Financials and its integration with our core databases will provide Virgin Megastores with a robust and scalable platform that provides trading information specifically for the finance department.

"The CODA solution provides us with an insight into our short- and long-term trading performance, and improves local reporting across our 94 stores throughout the UK and Ireland. It ensures that our financial information is easily managed in real-time whilst retaining integrity and security of business data. In addition, CODA-Financials provides us with vital euro support and data conversion, allowing us to be fully euro-compliant and continue our historical reporting," Robert Leaning added.

"Many retailers struggle with time-consuming and error-prone manual processes to convert the masses of data from merchandising and EPoS systems into meaningful information," said David Turner, International Marketing Manager, CODA. "The full integration and comprehensive reporting capabilities of CODA's solution simplifies and automates this process, enabling financial decisions to be made based on more than just the overall bottom line."

About Virgin Megastores
Established in the 1970s as a student magazine and small mail order record company, Virgin has since created over 200 companies worldwide, employing over 25,000 people. Virgin is now the third most recognised brand in Britain and is becoming the first global brand name of the 21st century. Virgin Retail (UK) Limited operates 94 entertainment Megastores in the UK and the Republic of Ireland.

For more information, please contact:

Robert Leaning
Financial Systems Development Manager
Virgin Megastores
Tel: +44 (0)208 7529109
robert.leaning@virginmega.co.uk