Celanese extends innovation to cash management transformation

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Celanese extends innovation to cash management transformation

Published: Sep 2025

Best Cash Management Solution

Overall Winner

Celanese Corporation

Photo of Stephen Kradzinski, J.P. Morgan, Hugo Rivera, Celanese Corporation and Steven Smith, HSBC.

Hugo Rivera

Director Treasury

USA
Celanese Corporation is a global leader in chemistry, specialising in specialty material solutions for a wide range of industries and consumer applications. Celanese employs over 11,000 people worldwide and achieved net sales of US$10.3bn in 2024.

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The challenge

Before 2024, Celanese had multiple banking partners by region and currency, managing over 750 global bank accounts, net sales in more than 25 currencies and operations in over 100 countries. The company had two separate liquidity structures due to acquisitions, creating opportunities for optimal cash concentration. In addition to the complexity and cost of managing 750+ bank accounts globally, approximately 75% of the accounts had automated bank statement processing, requiring manual tasks by the accounting and accounts receivable teams. This fragmentation led to opportunities to optimise cash management processes, reduce number of bank accounts and increase automation.

The solution

This project was strategically aligned to company goals for cost reduction, cash generation and debt repayment, necessitating a solution for faster, cost-effective cash deployment while maintaining global cash visibility.

The company embarked upon a global transformation journey in three phases:

Phase 1: upgraded the ERP system to SAP S/4HANA from ECC, providing enhanced financial capabilities, real-time analytics, and improved integration critical for a sophisticated treasury operation. Completed in May 2023, this upgrade established a strong technological foundation for treasury modernisation.

Phase 2: completed the largest acquisition in company history and integrated it into the SAP S/4HANA environment by February 2024. This consolidation improved efficiency, but Celanese realised the need to reimagine its treasury structure to fully realise cost savings, improve cash visibility, and optimise global cash management.

Phase 3: launched the bank redesign/restructure initiative with various banking partners. This project phase, from evaluation, selection and design to final implementation, was completed in November 2024.

“The objective was to enhance and optimise our cash management operations. Consolidating our cash management to a smaller number of banking providers for each region and improving availability and usability of cash globally to enhance self-funding and reduce costs. The collaborative work with our banking partners and company internal functions was critical for a successful project,” says Hugo Rivera, Director Treasury.

Banking partner, J.P. Morgan, added value creation by implementing a global liquidity structure. Cash in USD flows from APAC to EMEA into the United States, transitioning from regionally cash management to a globally integrated approach.

Celanese implemented a ‘follow the sun’ strategy, allowing each entity complete access to funds when needed. Cash moves from Asia to Europe to the United States daily, providing same-day liquidity during respective banking hours. This system respects complex local regulatory requirements in over 30 countries while maximising the movement of free market currencies to centralised accounts.

Additionally, Celanese partnered with HSBC to support APAC countries local currencies. “By having specific roles with our banking partners, we simplified our structure resulting in fewer bank accounts and cost reduction,” explains Rivera.

HSBC provides a high level of expertise for those countries, supports local regulatory needs, growth and helps reduce cash balances in local currencies and supports payments and collections only for the specific region and currencies in those regions.

Best practice and innovation

By strategically reducing the number of banking partners and centralising USD in the United States, Celanese fundamentally shifted its treasury mindset to balance global optimisation with regional autonomy. While regional teams maintain control of their local operations, the centralisation of USD management enables more cohesive liquidity oversight. Celanese has concentrated cash in fewer currencies and reduced the risk associated with currency fluctuations and disparate cash positions. This centralised approach allows the company to deploy cash efficiently where it delivers the highest returns while maintaining only necessary operating balances in local currencies.

Celanese deploys virtual accounts to streamline account management, reducing set-up times and costs compared to physical accounts.

Additionally, the company has implemented Kinexys from J.P. Morgan to facilitate around-the-clock, real-time cash movements globally, including US holidays, to complement the global cash structure. Celanese sweeps cash across regions in a way that optimises its liquidity concentration, and, with its bank’s technology, can integrate APIs to improve reporting time frames and further modernise treasury operations. Celanese completed the SAP S/4HANA integration in February 2024 and the bank redesign in November 2024 – delivering two major treasury transformations within a single calendar year.

Key benefits

Cost savings.
Headcount savings.
Number of banking partners/bank accounts reduced.
Process efficiencies.
Return on investment.
Increased automation.
Risk mitigated.
Improved visibility.
Errors reduced.
Manual intervention reduced.
Increased system connectivity.
Future-proof solution.
Exceptional implementation (budget/time).

Steven Smith

Regional Sales Sector Head – Energy, Materials & Power, Global Payments Solutions, HSBC

Evolving tech stacks – particularly ERP cloud migrations with SAP S/4HANA – are a common change driver that create opportunities for treasurers to reexamine their bank architecture. We were thrilled to facilitate this project and help Celanese reduce over 350 banks accounts across 100+ countries, centralise treasury operations, integrate seamlessly with SAP and unlock economies and efficiencies of scale. As the world’s largest Global Transaction Bank, we’re wholly focused on helping fast-forward companies like Celanese make their cash work harder.

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Stephen Kradzinski

Executive Director, J.P. Morgan Payments

Celanese underwent a significant global transformation in a short period of time, successfully completing multiple milestones while also laying the groundwork for future growth. Through M&A integration, ERP upgrades, and substantial global structural and technological enhancements, Celanese developed an efficient liquidity structure complemented by innovative technology to rationalise accounts, enhance payments and improve visibility and postings. This achievement was made possible by the support and coordination of the treasury teams globally, along with the cross-functional groups at Celanese. We are thrilled to see Celanese recognised for their efforts, and on behalf of the entire J.P. Morgan team, we wholeheartedly congratulate them.

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The Adam Smith Awards are the industry benchmark for best practice and innovation in corporate treasury. The 2025 awards attracted 454 nominations. To find out more please visit treasurytoday.com/adam-smith-awards

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