How a public biotech got its first week back from BvA
Public clinical co. · NetSuite + Planful
- Clinical, public co.
- NetSuite + Planful
- Excel, shared drive
- BvA flux · Roll-forward
7 days → 1 day
BvA cycle, from variance pull to roll-forward staged
Auto-commentary
Variances get draft commentary, with sources, by program and by department
BvA → RF
The same trigger pushes deltas into next month's forecast
“The agent does the digging, gives me draft commentary attached. I'm not Ctrl+F'ing through the GL anymore.”
R&D is $311K over plan and all of it is timing — Medpace pulled Phase 2 site activation forward from Q2. G&A is favorable $41K.
| Driver | Variance |
|---|---|
| Research & development | ($311,000) |
| 5000CRO & clinical trialsMedpace Phase 2 site activation pulled forward from Q2. Timing, not overrun. | ($312,400) |
| 5100Lab reagentsIn line with plan. | $1,400 |
| General & administrative | $40,900 |
| 6000Salaries & benefitsTwo open roles unfilled through March. | $8,700 |
| 6100Professional feesAudit fieldwork slipped to April. Expect the catch-up next month. | $32,200 |
Consolidated · sourced from NetSuite GL, refreshed 6:02 AM
Close, BvA, board prep, forecast, repeat
Month-end close is always a rush. Variances flagged in Planful had to be traced back through NetSuite, attributed to specific vendors and programs, written up as commentary, and reconciled with the department heads, before the roll-forward could even start.
By the time FP&A handed off to the CFO, a full work week was gone — mostly to pivot tables and Ctrl+F.
The agent does the digging, drafts in your style, you approve
Variance, attributed
The agent reads actuals from NetSuite, the budget from Planful, and works through every account that breached threshold. For each, it traces the variance to the underlying drivers and drafts commentary that names the cause. The FP&A team opens the file, reads what was found, and edits where it disagrees.
Roll-forward, chained
The same trigger pushes deltas into next month's forecast. Programs running ahead get reforecast upward; categories with timing shifts get redistributed. Roll-forward isn't a separate workflow anymore — it's the back half of BvA, staged for review.