Case Study: Carlsberg India
ANZ partnered with Carlsberg India to implement a digital payable financing programme designed to provide better value financing terms and reduce cash to conversion cycles.
The search for a suitable partner
Carlsberg India is on a path of growth and was looking to support a large number of suppliers (bottlers, packaging and raw material suppliers, transporters) through lower cost financing without adding any additional burden to their balance sheet.
Carlsberg India was looking for a partner who could deliver an easy to use, online payables financing programme which would also be suitable for the geographic size of India.
As payable finance as a product is in the development stage in the Indian market, it was also important that the partner could educate the supplier panel of the cost and operational benefits of participating in a centralised programme to meet their working capital needs.
Programme deliverables
Carlsberg India has benefitted from ANZ’s payables financing programme through:
- Providing suppliers with funding access at a lower cost by leveraging Carlsberg’s credit rating and in turn, improving supplier relationships
- A payables finance structure which improves its cash conversion cycle and is favourable to their balance sheet
- Delivering efficiency, transparency and automation to both Carlsberg India and suppliers via a single online platform (ANZ Transactive - Global).
ANZ's response
Global solution design
ANZ demonstrated cross collaboration across sales, product, legal, compliance, tax and operations teams across its extensive global footprint in India, United Kingdom, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia.
Trade expertise
As a global bank specialising in trade and supply chain solutions, ANZ was able to deliver and share analysis on industry benchmarking, competitor insights and best practices used in the industry. Using this knowledge, ANZ performed a detailed analysis of Carlsberg’s supplier terms and designed a payables finance programme which helped to improve their working capital whilst providing a low cost of finance to the suppliers.
ANZ’s extensive experience in delivering similar payable finance programmes internationally also provided them with the ability to help Carlsberg India to manage its risk appetite and in turn, offer competitive pricing to both Carlsberg and its supplier panel.
Online platform - ANZ Transactive
It was vital that suppliers were able to participate in the payables finance programme regardless of their location in India. ANZ ensured their solution was completely digital through our electronic banking platform, ANZ Transactive.
To ensure a seamless user experience for both parties, Carlsberg India was only required to upload invoice details into the portal. Suppliers then had the option to either select specific invoices on the portal for financing or ask ANZ to fund all invoices uploaded by Carlsberg India.
Bank account options via partnership with NACH
Initially, Carlsberg was reluctant on opening a bank account with ANZ. To offer this flexibility to Carlsberg and to ensure repayments were received seamlessly, ANZ set up a National Automated Clearing House (NACH) mandate with Carlsberg India’s local bank to ensure funds were pulled ANZ without interrupting the existing banking arrangements.
As the deal closed however, Carlsberg India did open a bank account with ANZ.
The solution
ANZ delivered a completely online solution which allowed Carlsberg to support their suppliers by providing them access to low cost capital (leveraging Carlsberg India’s credit rating) and simultaneously improve the cash to conversion cycle without negatively impacting the balance sheet.
Payables Finance Solution - Auto Finance Option
Payables Finance Solution - Transactional Finance Option

Programme awards
The Asset Triple A - Treasury, Trade, SSC
and Risk Management Awards 2020
Adam Smith Awards Asia 2019
Treasury Management International (TMI) 2019
What's next?
The success of the payables financing programme has opened up further opportunities for ANZ and Carlsberg to explore cash management and working capital solutions globally, backed up by ANZ’s strong relationship approach.
- The establishment of the NACH mandate has increased ANZ’s capability to offer similar payables finance solutions for companies operating across India.
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