Sarbanes-Oxley Challenges Continue for US Companies

3 March 2005
Atlanta, Georgia
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

With the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in place since January, companies are still feeling their way through the difficulties of compliance. Section 404 of the Act requires that financial reporting for public companies is both accurate and reliable by establishing a set of internal accounting controls. The Wall Street Journal reports that nearly 500 companies have reported deficiencies with their internal controls – and one of the key areas for improvement is cost management.

As part of the Journal’s investigation, nearly 50 public filings from the group reporting weaknesses were reviewed. Some of the more common problems noted were “…unfettered access employee access to some financial systems” and “…difficulty in tracking and reporting costs.” Manufacturing companies are now turning to enterprise cost management to aid them in both reporting accurate costs and meeting the security and auditing requirements of SOX 404. These companies are eliminating spreadsheets regularly used because they have lax security features and are prone to errors. Companies across process-intensive industries are improving cost performance while establishing solid internal accounting controls.

Impact:ECS, the leading enterprise cost system, is a comprehensive tool that gives managers the ability to track, calculate, report and simulate costs for their entire production process. The flexible design allows users to develop Models that exactly replicate how costs are accumulated in production. It integrates with enterprise resource planning (ERP) and manufacturing execution (MES) systems to ensure data integrity throughout the costing process. With clients in industry verticals including semiconductors, food processing, paper and textile, Impact:ECS can handle the complexities required to calculate costs at the company, plant, client, order or individual product levels.

The client/server design allows for permission-based security access to centralized, confidential financial data for both the desktop and web applications. Companies with multiple production locations also benefit from the ability to develop a common costing platform allowing for better business performance analysis and tracking. With the Model Audit feature incorporated in the latest release, the administrator can easily track and verify changes for all Impact:ECS Models by type, user or period of time.

About 3C Software
3C Software, developers of Impact:ECSâ„¢ and Impact:3C®, was founded in 1989 and is a leader in detailed cost management systems for process manufacturers. Headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, 3C Software serves clients in several manufacturing industries including automotive, textile and apparel, pulp and paper, semiconductor, chemical and rubber, and food and beverage. 3C Software’s rapidly implemented solutions work with all accounting methods, are simple to maintain, and handle unlimited calculations and variables. For more information about 3C Software, visit www.3csoftware.com or call 800-226-2036.