How Cobase supports Adragos Pharma's expansion

As a globally operating pharmaceutical Contract Development and Manufacturing Organisation (CDMO), Adragos Pharma has experienced significant growth. Its mission is to ensure pharmaceuticals remain accessible, available, affordable, and impeccable. With five production sites spread across France, Germany, Greece, and Japan, Adragos caters to a broad customer base and provides end-to-end services in the small-molecule segment.

The company's dynamic growth, however, brought certain challenges. Managing cash across multiple bank accounts became increasingly demanding, consuming time and resources. The treasury team faced the issue of gathering data from different bank accounts to create a daily cash position – a process that was both time-consuming and complex.

Adragos found a solution to these challenges through Cobase, a platform that simplifies and automates cash management and banking connectivity. Cobase allows for a seamless connection with any number of banks, offering a comprehensive view of a company’s cash position. This is made possible through Cobase's extensive library of pre-existing bank connections and payment and reporting templates.

One of the crucial features of Cobase that Adragos has benefited from is the automation of financial workflows. Cobase's platform enables the automation of repetitive tasks, significantly reducing the time spent on manual data entry and the risk of human error.

The platform can also adapt to changing workflows as the company grows and evolves, ensuring seamless operations at all times. Furthermore, Cobase supports Adragos in providing insights and dashboards for more insight. These dashboards present key financial data in a clear, concise, and real-time manner, enabling to make informed decisions. They provide visibility into the company's financial health, cash flow, and operational efficiency, among other critical areas.

Under the stewardship of Corporate Treasurer, Adragos has been able to leverage Cobase’s services effectively. Currently, Adragos uses Cobase's reporting and payments modules and is in the process of implementing the in-house banking module.

Adragos Pharma has recognized the potential in leveraging Cobase's in-house banking module to manage its intercompany loans efficiently. Given the scope of Adragos' operations, with corporate cash spread across multiple subsidiaries, the company faced challenges in optimizing the use of this cash.

Cobase's in-house banking structure offers a solution to this problem by facilitating balance optimization, which is easy to set up and manage. To manage its growth more effectively, Adragos uses Cobase's comprehensive in-house banking product suite, which can handle everything from cash concentration to payments-on-behalf-of (POBO), collections-on-behalf-of(COBO), inter-company bookings, and long-term loan management.

Specifically, regarding intercompany loans, Cobase can handle both fixed and variable interest rates, offering the choice of reporting interest payments due for manual payment or capitalizing the interest to augment the loan balance. In the process of balance optimization and in-house banking, every transaction is recorded for auditing purposes and can be accessed through a streamlined interface for approval or later checks.

Adragos' journey with Cobase extends beyond just managing existing operations. As the company acquires new entities and grows, Cobase supports them by seamlessly integrating new banks and accounts into their financial management system. This has been evident in recent acquisitions such as the purchase of Sanofi’s manufacturing plant in Kawagoe, Japan, and Lamda Laboratories in Athens, purchased from Clinigen Limited.

Throughout these expansions, Cobase has played an integral role in maintaining efficient cash management and smooth financial operations. Its cloud-based system allows for automatic data collection, reducing manual input, and providing areal-time view of cash position. The system also facilitates easy onboarding and offboarding of authorized users and signatories on a business, bank, or account level.

In addition to these benefits, Cobase has proved vital in enhancing security and compliance for Adragos. The platform’s automatic sanction screening and end-to-end encrypted connections ensure that payments are secure and in line with regulations. It also provides an end-to-end audit trail for all payments, adding an extra layer of security and accountability.

As Adragos continues to grow, its relationship with Cobase promises to be instrumental in managing the complexities of multi-bank cash management and corporate payments. With the continued support of Cobase, Adragos can focus on its mission to keep pharmaceuticals accessible, available, affordable, and of the highest quality.