PALO ALTO, CALIF. - Bill.com, the leader in integrated bill payment, online invoicing and cash management solutions for businesses, today introduced a revolutionary financial management platform designed to help banks replace their existing online bill payment solution for business with a more comprehensive alternative. For the first time, the Bill.com cloud-based platform, already widely adopted among business users and accountants, enables banks to offer business customers powerful accounts payable and accounts receivable services, develop additional revenue streams and increase customer acquisition and retention.
Online business banking represents a multi-billion dollar industry annually, but current solutions provided by banks are limited to transactional payment processes alone. This leaves businesses of all sizes with the need to use disparate bill payment and accounting solutions in order to gain control of their finances. The result is a cumbersome process plagued by inefficiencies, security risks and errors. The Bill.com platform offers banks an easily deploy-able solution that works the way businesses work. It serves as a bridge between accounting software and the bank to bring AP and AR processes together - including bill payment, online invoicing and cash management services - in one seamless, easy-to-use platform.
"Over the past few years, we've talked to thousands of our business customers of all sizes, and we understand that they are frustrated with their accounting software and bank bill payment operating in silos," said René Lacerte, founder and CEO, Bill.com. "Today's online banking solutions were created for consumers and adapted for businesses, and they are clearly falling short from a business perspective." Lacerte added, "The Bill.com platform was created specifically for the business user. It pulls financial data and information together seamlessly all in one location, which means no more juggling various financial systems, duplicating entries or guessing about cash flow position. With the Bill.com platform, banks can provide their business customers with the new-found ability to make confident decisions and take the right course of action for their business."
Since 2006, Bill.com users have benefited from the platform's award-winning collaboration tools, mobile access and document storage capabilities. Now, banks that implement the Bill.com platform can serve as a central financial hub to their customers, helping them gain these benefits and more, including streamlined communication with vendors, the ability to pay and get paid faster, and real-time access to cash flow information. "We estimate there are four million businesses in the U.S. that could realize efficiencies in their treasury operations by using an offering like Bill.com," said John Barlow, President, Barlow Research Associates. "Our research shows that these business owners and treasury managers are looking to their primary bank for ideas on how to reduce costs and improve cash flow. For many businesses these solutions from their bank are even more important than providing credit. Understanding how cash moves through a business and helping to improve that process is the heart of a trusted adviser strategy that so many banks are struggling to achieve."
"There's no question banks are struggling to pinpoint new services that can serve as fee revenue drivers," said Dana Bowers, founder of iPay and Bill.com investor. "The Bill.com business banking platform provides exactly what banks need to turn the corner and create new revenue streams while providing tremendous value to their most valuable customer base, businesses. The Bill.com platform will keep customers active on their bank site instead of in their accounting software or in cumbersome spreadsheets. This is an extremely powerful value proposition, and Bill.com is already seeing huge interest from a number of large banks."
Bill.com, which recently raised $15.5 million in Series D funding, will continue to enhance the offering based on customer feedback. The company also announced that Mercantile Bank of Michigan, based in Grand Rapids, Mich., will be the first bank to roll out the Bill.com technology platform early this year.
"We see lots of companies that have built individual features, but no one else has built an integrated solution that's also easy for businesses to use," said Mark Johnson, co-founder of CheckFree, current partner at TTV Capital and Bill.com board member. "Tens of thousands of customers already use and love Bill.com, and the platform stands alone in its ability to provide banks with such extensive capabilities. Bill.com has built this platform over the course of several years and it's going to be extremely difficult for a competitor to replicate their offering in the short term. There is no doubt Bill.com will be a major player in helping banks support their business customers in an entirely new manner."
For more information about the Bill.com financial platform for banks, please contact Bill.com at banks@hq.bill.com.
About Bill.com
Bill.com is a cash flow command and control system that manages accounts payable and receivable for businesses of all sizes. Offering online bill pay, custom invoicing services, unlimited document storage, collaboration tools, and mobile access, Bill.com's services easily sync to users' accounting software programs and online bank accounts to better control company financials. Bill.com guards against errors and employs enterprise-class fraud protections that current methods cannot match. More than 100,000 users are now paying millions of bills worth billions of dollars using Bill.com.