Shamrock Foods is a major food distributor centered in Tralee, Ireland. Originally a dairy cooperative, they branched into various food components [dried milk, cheese solids, and flavorings (or flavourings, as they would spell it)]. They have had substantial growth, most coming by way of acquisition of existing companies or facilities. For example, Iowa Soybean in the United States in now a subsidiary of Shamrock Foods, as is a large dairy cooperative in Wisconsin.

They have processing facilities in more than twelve countries and distribution sales in more than thirty countries.

With the rapid growth by acquisition, they have generally adopted a hands-off policy, keeping the systems separated and not integrated into unified ERP system.

Thus, each acquired company is still largely autonomous, although it reports to Shamrock Foods and is managed by Shamrock Foods.

This separation concept has been a problem for the CFO of Shamrock Foods, Conor Lynch. The board of directors would like some aggregated data for direction and analysis of acquired businesses. Conor has the reports from the various subsidiaries but has to have his staff convert them to a consistent basic currency (generally either to euros or U.S. dollars).

Questions 1. When should a multinational or multisite business consolidate data systems?

2. There are costs associated with consolidating data systems—the various acquired companies had their own functioning accounting systems—with a variety of hardware and software systems. What justification should Conor use to push for a consolidated, unified ERP system?

3. Conor at times has to deal with incomplete and incompatible data. Inventory systems might be first in, first out (FIFO) for some of the subsidiaries and last in, first out (LIFO) or another accounting method for other subsidiaries. How might a multinational CFO deal with incomplete and incompatible data?