Change and Transformation in the Private Sector
Tropicana Brands Group (TBG) needed to separate from its former parent company, PepsiCo, and become a standalone business focused on juice products. As well as establishing standalone technology and processes, it aimed to launch as a lean business that used the latest enterprise technology to create a platform for growth.
After experiencing similar carve-outs in the past, TBG Europe’s Chief Transformation Officer was determined to engage an experienced consulting team to bring the leadership, functional and technical expertise that would ensure the programme’s success. PwC were therefore appointed and, with just 12 months in which to achieve the separation and transformation, quickly built on established relationships with the client team.
Although SAP technology would be central to the transformation, the TBG and PwC team adopted a ‘business integration’ approach, to deliver real commercial benefits. The firm developed a level of trust and challenge that enabled it to work pragmatically and rapidly. It drew on its experience of carve-outs and business processes, including user stories that accelerated the design process and presented new ways of working as an opportunity to improve on established practices.
In addition to the core business team, the firm stood up a Europe deployment team to address programme-specific needs such as testing, training, data migration and cutover. The Europe teams also liaised with systems integration partners and TBG’s global leadership, to keep the European transformation synchronised with the client’s parallel transformation in North America.
The TBG and PwC programme team took an innovative approach to programme governance, and brought senior leaders together every week, in steering meetings that focused on critical business processes. This unusual, but highly-effective, mix of seniority and frequency helped sustain the client’s commitment to rapid progress at the highest level.
Meanwhile, the programme’s scale, complexity and pace meant the work was intensive, and PwC took care to maintain the team’s wellbeing. Heatmaps identified that some TBG individuals were operating at 150% capacity, which enabled the firm to raise additional contractor requirements and – by using Generative AI – minimise the extra HR effort of creating new job profiles for TBG.
The strength of PwC’s client relationship and the dedication of its teams enabled the firm to manage a major, mission-critical issue when a set of supply chain interfaces were delayed by several months. By gaining support for a revised plan, using dedicated teams to target critical areas, the firm not only addressed the issue effectively, but also achieved separation three months ahead of schedule.
As a result, TBG made significant savings in TSA fees and the programme has dramatically reduced the complexity of TBG’s technology landscape. Production operations were quickly ramped up, the first month-end close for the new business was completed in just one week, and the business experienced negligible disruption.
By combining highly effective working relationships with extensive carve-out experience, the team surpassed the programme’s objectives in the face of major obstacles, and delivered ahead of an already-ambitious timescale, while TBG’s customers have enjoyed a near-seamless transition to dealing with the new business.
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