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RoseRyan launches specialty XBRL practice

(Newark, Calif., July 19, 2011) — Now that June 15 has come and gone, every public company’s next quarterly filing must be eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) compliant. Companies are scrambling to tag financial data with XBRL and, depending on a company’s public float size, this means either leapfrogging to detailed tagging or performing either block or detailed tagging for the first time.

To help companies comply with this SEC mandate, RoseRyan has formally announced the launch of its XBRL practice. An accounting and finance consulting firm in Silicon Valley noted for its technical accounting expertise, the firm has been involved with implementing XBRL adoption since the start of the first phase-in group.

XBRL practice delivers flexibility, comprehensive services
Focusing on developing internal controls for XBRL tagging, tag selection advice and quality assurance, RoseRyan’s new XBRL practice is flexible and comprehensive. The firm’s experts make sure that financial data is correctly tagged, tells the right story and is transparent as well as comparable. Clients can get help with project planning, making sense of their software options and working with printers; RoseRyan can handle compliance from start to finish or work with a company’s software service or printer.

“We’ve helped well-known high-tech and life sciences companies in the San Francisco Bay Area with their XBRL adoption process, and we’ve found that tagging, done right, can be fairly complex,” says Kathy Ryan, CEO, CFO and a co-founder of RoseRyan.

She adds, “If you’ve been planning to send this work to the printer, you could be in for a rude awakening. Printers assign tags based on broad assumptions; they don’t have the detailed knowledge of your financial statements or the technical accounting expertise to assure accuracy. That can result in tags that are too broad—or worse, they are wrong.”

RoseRyan goes beyond what printers normally provide by delivering an independent mapping based on a detailed review of the client’s financial data and disclosures. In addition, RoseRyan benchmarks a client’s tags against those of its peers, which ensures a more complete “apples-to-apples” comparison, the goal of XBRL.

RoseRyan’s six-step methodology
RoseRyan’s XBRL experts advocate that companies take full ownership of the XBRL process, rather than relying on their printer or software service. Why? Because companies are ultimately responsible for their financial data, says Ryan.

To allow companies to take that control, RoseRyan has developed a six-step implementation process that provides best practices, step-by-step project management, quality assurance and validations, software tools and training, and more.

“The RoseRyan XBRL methodology simplifies the complex by focusing on data quality, consistency, comparability and accuracy of financial data. Our approach addresses what XBRL is all about—financial information exchange that improves internal and external transparency,” says Lucy Lee, who heads RoseRyan’s XBRL practice and is a member of the Best Practices Committee for XBRL US, the national consortium for XML business reporting standards.

The firm’s six-part XBRL process has quality assurance at its core, and ensures that subsequent filings are pain free. It includes the following building blocks for successful implementation:

  • Premapping and alternative tags consideration
  • Peer benchmarking
  • Disclosure controls and procedures design
  • Quality assurance of data rendering and metadata
  • Review for common errors (accounting data consistency check, SEC and technical validations)
  • Monitoring for updates and evolving standards
  • Assessing readiness for detailed tagging

Beyond XBRL compliance: a silk purse
For clients who want to go beyond basic XBRL compliance, RoseRyan dives deeper, turning a mandated sow’s ear of a chore into a silk purse of lasting value. For example, embedding tags and integrating the process into the close and external reporting preparation can deliver a nifty by-product: system and process improvements that enhance overall operations and drive down costs quarter after quarter, year after year.

About RoseRyan
A finance and accounting consulting firm located in Silicon Valley, RoseRyan tackles critical assignments for companies at all stages, with particular expertise in high tech, life sciences and cleantech industries. The firm’s finance gurus serve as outsourced CFOs, prepare companies for IPOs and M&As, perform immaculate corporate governance work and are sought after for expert advice on emerging accounting challenges. Its roots in the region go deep—RoseRyan has been getting high-flying companies’ financial houses in order since 1993—and clients benefit from a strong network of partners who can help their businesses grow. Recent and current clients include Actelion, Netflix, NVIDIA, KidZania, Philips Lumileds and CalCEF.

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