As the payment landscape becomes increasingly complex, some companies are prioritizing improvements to their accounts payable (A/P) processes. For our 2024 Gold Alexander Hamilton Award winner in the category Working Capital & Payments, those improvements meant bringing the efficiency of payment processes into alignment with the company’s overall ethos.

• Gold Award: Despite the fact that Hitachi, Ltd. is one of the world’s largest conglomerates, all its business units outside of Japan used to manage their own payments. Global A/P processes cost more than they needed to, and central treasury had limited visibility into impending cash flows in most of the world. An organization known for optimizing efficiency, Hitachi treasury knew this situation needed to be rectified. The company leveraged technology to roll out a new in-house bank and payment-on-behalf-of (POBO) structure that enable a global shared service center to manage all outgoing payments. This improved corporate treasury’s control over payments and their insights into changing cash balances, supporting better business decision-making and substantially improving efficiency companywide.