At a glance:
Division: CV (commercial vehicles)
Volume: 2,000+ POs and 3,000+ invoices a year; 15+ national and zonal campaigns
Spend mix: about 60% BTL and 40% media
Setup: Brandintellé as the marketing layer above SAP, not a replacement for it
The challenge:
A lean marketing team at Tata Motors Commercial Vehicles handled high volumes across a fragmented stack: RFQs in one tool, budgets in SAP and Excel, POs in another system, billing in another, and SAP for payments. That meant more than five systems and no single status page for any campaign.
For Marketing:
Launches slipped by 2–14 days whenever approvals or POs stalled. In one case, a variant launch planned for day 1 still had no PO with the vendor by day 30.
To protect launch dates, Launch pressure meant work sometimes moved faster than the paperwork.
Vendor estimates arrived by email, and no one could see where they were stuck.
Four lines of business were managed across spreadsheets, so allocations and roll-ups were error-prone.
For Finance:
Every invoice was re-keyed into SAP, taking about 20 minutes each.
Month-end provisioning meant chasing data across teams for about 5 days.
Controls depended on people, so a PO could exceed its approved limit.
Proof was hard to verify: BTL photos had no location data, and TV spots couldn’t be checked against what actually aired.
What changed:
Brandintellé became the single marketing system of record, connected to SAP.
Budgets and approval limits: budgets are uploaded and approved by brand, variant, market and channel. They lock at PO stage, so no commitment can exceed its approved limit.
Briefs and RFQs in the platform: one brief goes to several vendors, plans come back in a comparable format, and every decision is logged.
Estimates with visible status: vendors upload estimates, and Marketing sees whether each is pending, on hold or rejected, with reasons.
POs without retyping: key fields carry over from the approved estimate, approvals happen on mobile, and the PO goes to the vendor automatically.
Invoice validation: hard checks on GST and tax codes, PO, date, value and MSME rules. Invoices that don't comply can't be submitted.
Native proof: camera-only, geo-tagged photos for BTL, and TV schedules checked against BARC data for media. Proof links to each invoice line.
One click to SAP: verified invoices post with their documents, and vendor, tax and brand master data stays in sync.
Automatic provisioning and MIS built from work completions, including the Monday leadership deck.
The results:
Invoice posting: about 20 minutes → about 2 minutes each (10× faster)
Provisioning: about 5 days → about 1 day a month
Campaign delays: 2–14 days per launch → zero
Vendor escalations: down 80%; payment escalations eliminated
PO limit breaches: zero after hard-stop controls
Proof integrity: photo reuse stopped, and incorrect TV spot claims are flagged
In their words:
“In my career, I've built and implemented many marketing tools, but Brandintellé's budgeting module is one of the few that truly understands the marketing domain. Earlier, we were stuck managing SAP IO codes manually, with limited visibility. Now, the entire workflow, from request to approval to activation, is automated. We finally have clear control and transparency across budgets, built specifically for the pace and complexity of marketing teams.”
GM Finance, CV division of a leading Indian automaker
Why it worked:
Controls act before money moves. Budget and approval-limit checks happen at PO stage, not at audit.
SAP stays. Finance keeps its accounting system, and Brandintellé adds the marketing layer above it.
One truth for both sides. Marketing gets visibility and Finance gets control, from the same data.
Proof is built in, not attached. Geo and BARC data tie directly to what gets paid.
