Western Australia's Gold Corporation, a state-owned entity that operates as the Perth Mint, needed a smarter metals trading and reporting system. Trading gold as well as silver, platinum and palladium with customers all over the world, it was critical that the system was best-in-class. Building on the strength and adaptability of Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations software, the solution helped Gold Corporation manage business processes more efficiently, and make smart decisions while adding lasting value.
How PwC made every ounce count for Gold Corporation
When Australia’s only state-owned precious metals enterprise wanted to transform its complex precious metal business with an out-of-the-box cloud ERP solution based on Microsoft's Dynamics 365 (D365) platform, it brought in PwC Australia to devise the solution.
Gold Corporation presented PwC Australia with a unique challenge. The task was to design and implement a best-in-class metal accounting system on Microsoft’s Dynamics 365 that could ensure every precious ounce of metal in the multi-faceted enterprise was fully accounted for across thousands of transactions every day.
At any one time Gold Corporation, which trades as the Perth Mint, holds A$6 billion worth of gold, and in 2020-21 it distributed some A$26 billion worth of gold, silver and platinum bullion bars and coins to investors in 130 countries.
As Chris Young, Gold Corporation's Group Manager Finance, says:
“There was a very high level of difficulty in the task we set ourselves because of the intricacies of accounting for metal. Coming to grips with that was no simple thing.”
The challenge
Before bringing in PwC, Gold Corporation used offline tools to reconcile metal stocks and trades. To complicate matters further, the metal commodities balancing was managed outside their legacy ERP solution, Axapta 3 (a predecessor of Dynamics 365). This was an intensive process and therefore presented an opportunity for process improvements that could give rise to a meaningful uplift in efficiency and remove friction.
The solution – where human meets digital
Gold Corporation selected PwC's Perth-based team, led by Managing Director Rudi Van Nieuwenhuizen, because of their deep experience in precious metals environments.
The first step in designing and implementing a tailor-made solution of such complexity on Dynamics 365 was to call on PwC's community of solvers.
Van Nieuwenhuizen tapped into expertise from PwC South Africa to tackle the business challenge and called on developers with PwC India to fit the technology to Gold Corporation's unique specifications.
A project of this complexity was always going to be challenging, and it was at this point, where humans meet digital, PwC added a focus few others could match.
The secret to success with Gold Corporation, says Van Nieuwenhuizen, was the trust his team built along with core PwC values such as Working Together.
“Of course, to succeed you need to know how the business works and you need perseverance when things are tough. But never underestimate the value of every single person involved because they are key to achieving your goal."
“Some people may think the problem is too big to solve, but they should never be left behind. It means if something unexpected happens, and it always will, everyone is working together. No time is wasted on blame because we are all working to the same goal.”
Gold Corporation’s Chris Young agrees:
“PwC were very good at the human side. Their calm approach under pressure and perseverance was incredible. They ultimately found a solution that worked for everyone.”
A gold star outcome
The story began in 2015 when Gold Corporation began to scope out suitable products and ended with a go-live in November 2021 of a reliable and upgradable ERP that transformed data capture to support 24/7 operations across multiple business units.
It has set up Gold Corporation to deliver on its longer-term goals.
Chris Young sums it up:
“We have thousands of transactions every day and now I can run a report in 30 seconds which gives a good idea of where everything is. We've come a long way.”
For Gold Corporation, the value that PwC added was their deep knowledge of the business. Chris Young says:
“The speed with which they were able to develop an understanding of our business was extraordinary. “But it was the care factor that made PwC stand out. They were totally invested in helping us get the right answer.”
Gold Corporation’s Acting CFO James Sawyer says he would highly recommend PwC Australia.
"The PwC team was an extremely high quality group of people."
“We knew there’d be some unexpected issues and roadblocks along the way, and the PwC team were an amazing sounding board through that whole process."
“It’s not just that they were on top of all the technical stuff, or how well they dealt with every problem we threw at them. They were also super pleasant people to work with, which is important when you embark on such a long journey together.”
