University of Chicago Enhances Oracle Fusion Grant Management with Orbit Analytics

Having a system where every research dollar and project milestone is not only tracked but transformed into a powerful narrative of progress and potential is essential for higher education institutions. At the University of Chicago, this vision has become a reality by integrating Oracle Fusion Grants Management and Oracle PPM modules with Orbit Analytics. As a leading institution committed to innovation and research, the University of Chicago has adopted higher education ERP solutions to optimize financial reporting and ensure compliance with grant funding regulations.

By leveraging an advanced ERP for financials, the university efficiently manages both sponsored and non-sponsored funding, ensuring transparency in tracking expenditures, budgeting, and award lifecycles. This strategic approach enhances decision-making for faculty, researchers, and administrators. Read on to discover how these innovative tools are driving a new era of transparency, efficiency, and success at one of the nation’s premier research institutions.

University of Chicago:

The University of Chicago is a prestigious private research university founded in 1890 in Chicago, Illinois. Known for its rigorous academic programs and intellectual culture, it is a hub for groundbreaking research across disciplines. The university emphasises critical thinking, interdisciplinary collaboration, and innovation and offers undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs in a wide array of fields.

The University of Chicago has a strong grants management system designed to support its research-driven environment. It offers extensive services to help faculty, researchers, and staff secure and manage grants from federal, state, corporate, and foundation sources.

The University of Chicago extensively utilises the Oracle Fusion Grants Management and Oracle PPM (Project Portfolio Management) modules to streamline pre-award and post-award processes, promoting innovation and collaboration while ensuring accountability on how universities manage sponsored and non-sponsored research funding. This module offers tools and methods to manage external funding, ensure compliance with sponsor requirements, and enhance financial and operational efficiency.

Key features of Grants Management and PPM Modules in Oracle Fusion include:

1. Management of grant proposals and award lifecycle management
2. Budgeting and funding allocations
3. Tracking of expenditures
4. Billing and revenue management
5. Compliance and audit oversight
6. Seamless integration with other Oracle modules

To address the need for a comprehensive system capable of representing data tailored to specific departmental requirements, the University of Chicago sought a business intelligence and analytics platform with a user-friendly interface and robust reporting capabilities.

Orbit Analytics, widely used across industries to streamline decision-making by delivering real-time, actionable insights from various data sources, was selected as the solution provider. Renowned for its seamless integration with enterprise systems like ERP for financials and CRM platforms, Orbit Analytics enables efficient data extraction from the Fusion application. It offers powerful tools for creating reports and dashboards. These features support daily reporting and decision-making activities.

Here’s how the Orbit tool helped the University of Chicago meet its reporting and analysis needs:

Unit Financial Dashboards:

Key outcomes of these dashboards include:

• Income Statement View: This view displays revenue, expenses, and transfers for the selected month based on the budget established by each unit during the planning process.
• Funding Categories: Provides a breakdown of funding by category, such as Endowments, Federal Grants, Gifts, and Private Grants. Offers funding details categorised into Sponsored and Non-Sponsored data.
• Year-to-Date Performance: Presents a year-to-date view of unit performance compared to budget and forecasts, helping to predict year-end outcomes.
• Year-over-Year Comparison: Compares current year-to-date (YTD) results to the same period in the prior year, providing insights into revenue and expense trends to help identify corrective actions if outcomes deviate from expectations.

Procurement Analysis:

Some of the key outcomes of these dashboards include:

• Supplier Profile: These dashboards display data for all suppliers, enabling stakeholders to review key metrics such as Active vs. Inactive suppliers, the number of tax-reporting suppliers, suppliers by default payments, supplier types, and procurement categories. It provides a high-level overview of how suppliers are represented within the application.
  The dashboards also feature key graphs showing invoice payment amounts categorised by business classifications (e.g., Minority-Owned, Woman-Owned, Veteran-Owned, etc.) and purchasing categories.Additionally, the Joint Spend Analysis dashboard provides visibility on Top-10 Spends by Supplier, Amount paid to Suppliers in the Fiscal Year and the amount spent by the supplier.
• Purchase Order and Requisition Inquiry: These dashboards present various KPIs and charts, including Total Order Amount, Open Order Amounts, Purchase Order Lines and Amounts categorised by Line Status, an overview of standing purchase orders, and purchase order change order details. Provides a complete overview of requisitions at the line level across different entities.

Payables Analysis:

This section is primarily designed for accounting professionals, procurement teams, and payables managers, enabling them to gain insights into payment trends, outstanding liabilities, vendor relationships, and overall financial reporting. It includes a variety of dashboards and drill-down reports, offering users visibility into key aspects of purchasing, such as:

• Purchase Order Analysis
• Accounts Payable (AP) Transactions
• Details of Invoices on Hold and Closed Invoices
• Check Cycle Extract
• Invoice Workflow Details
• Payables Invoice Aging Reports
• Payment Registers
• Invoice Approval Details
• Distribution-Level Drill-Down Reports

These reports provide data at a granular level, including insights aligned with the Chart of Accounts (COA), allowing for detailed financial reporting and decision-making.

Award Management:

Delivers insights into funding through awards categorised by Principal Investigators. Key performance indicators (KPIs) highlight awards exceeding budget, awards nearing expiration, and total balances across various award attributes, such as Sponsored Awards, Internal Awards, and Discretionary Awards.

Additionally, it provides a high-level overview of projects funded by these awards, including expenditure details, monthly breakdowns, and information about project team members.

There are dashboards available to provide complete information about the awards, budgets, funding, and balances of various business units specifically designed for key stakeholders responsible for maintaining financial data across these business units. Detailed-level reports to visualise KPIs, Charts and Result tables are available for Funding, Encumbrances, Expenses, and budgets across various projects and awards.

Projects Management:

The University of Chicago utilises the Oracle Fusion PPM Module to enhance project planning, execution, tracking, and financial management. The module facilitates efficient budgeting, monitors project progress, and tracks balances at the project, task, and expenditure levels.

The dashboards provide comprehensive insights into project performance, showcasing progress through Inception-to-Date (ITD) and Year-to-Date (YTD) values calculated for a designated fiscal period. Additionally, account reconciliation reports ensure the organisation’s financial records are accurate, consistent, and aligned, thereby preserving the integrity of economic data.

Enhancing Your University Financial Management with Advanced Reporting

By integrating Oracle Fusion Grants Management, Oracle PPM Modules, and Orbit Analytics, the University of Chicago has streamlined higher education ERP solutions to optimize financial reporting. This ERP for financials enables seamless grant funding and compliance tracking, efficient management of sponsored and non-sponsored funding, and real-time financial insights.

With unit financial dashboards, procurement analysis, and payables tracking, the university ensures precision, transparency, and accountability in research funding. These advancements redefine how universities track grant funding and compliance, improving financial workflows and decision-making.

Looking to transform your institution’s financial reporting and grant management? Contact Orbit Analytics expert team today to discover how our advanced solutions can drive efficiency and success.