Basware Announces Major Global Expansion Drive as Bookings Grow 52% in 2023

Basware, a global leader in AP automation and invoice processing, has announced major global expansion plans.

Bookings rose 52 per cent and Recurring Revenue Growth accelerated year-over-year (YoY) in 2023.  

In 2023, Basware acquired Glantus alongside expanding its footprint globally, including markets such as APAC and Southern Europe. Basware has ambitious plans to continue its expansion across the US, Europe and APAC with further investment in customer growth, AI innovation, compliance and fraud prevention expected this year.

Last year, the company made several key hires including Jason Kurtz as CEO to lead the company’s growth strategy. Basware also welcomed Steve Canning as Chief Revenue Officer and Mark Johnston as Chief Customer Success Officer to drive growth and value for customers throughout the sales and customer cycle.

Over 2023, following a rebrand and focus on AP (accounts payable) automation, Basware expanded with more than 100 high-profile brands including DHL Express and Alstom, while adding to its global portfolio of 900+ AP customers. It maintained a customer retention rate of 97.4 per cent, for brands that saw value to remain a Basware customer. In 2023, Basware handled over 220 million invoices and $900bn in invoice spend through its platform.

Basware continued to deliver innovative pro made duct solutions in 2023, including SmartPDF with AI Instant Learning that trains AI to recognise exception invoices, an AP Team Performance Discovery dashboard to better manage AP workload, and generative AI customer service tool AskMary.

For almost 40 years, Basware’s AI-enabled AP automation and invoice processing platform has empowered Chief Financial Officers and finance teams at enterprise organisations such as HP and Mercedes-Benz to automatically handle invoices, greatly reducing processing time while boosting accuracy and compliance. With increasing compliance demands for financial teams, Basware helps customers keep up with regulatory mandates and e-invoicing requirements in specific markets around the world. 

In 2023, Basware was recognised as a Gartner Peer Insights™ Customers’ Choice for Procure-to-Pay Suites based on customer reviews.

Jason Kurtz, CEO at Basware, said: 

“Our commitment to supporting the office of the CFO continues to be a driving force behind Basware’s expansion. Last year, we had one of the most successful financial years in Basware’s 40-year history, and what’s most satisfying about our accomplishments is the positive feedback we’ve received from our customers. Whether it’s Gartner’s Peer Insights or the direct comments we receive about our enhanced customer experience, we are thrilled that the changes we’ve made are positively impacting our customers and we know that the best is yet to come.”

“Basware’s focus for 2024 centres on supporting enterprise businesses to elevate their finance processes to best practice levels and create value by meeting the ever-changing regulatory needs of financial teams. With our partner first strategy, we are fully aligned to showcase the quantifiable business value of Basware’s solutions, and our strategy continues in enabling all of our customers to be 100 per cent touchless in their AP departments.”

To drive further growth, Basware has developed a partner first strategy, bolstered by the appointment of Kevin Farrell in 2023 as SVP, Business Development and Alliances. Its strategy will drive innovation for finance teams at enterprises through Basware’s collaboration with professional services firms, financial consultancies and value-added resellers. To enable this strategy, Basware is undertaking a modernisation of its knowledge management and e-learning tools to ensure integrated knowledge flows across its organisation and partner ecosystem. 

Services to prevent fraud and ensure compliance are another core pillar of Basware's growth plans in 2024. It acquired Glantus in October 2023 and expanded its AI-driven overpayment and fraud detection capabilities to alleviate the pressures for over 70 per cent of businesses subject to invoice or payment fraud each year.

Basware became a privately-held corporation in 2022 in a go-private transaction led by software private equity firm Accel-KKR. 

Dean Jacobson, Chairman of the Board at Basware, and Managing Director at Accel-KKR, commented: 

“The finance function is central to every business, and continues to be more complex as businesses grow. Technology is vital in providing CFOs and their finance teams with the scale, speed and accuracy required to meet business demands. Basware is well on its way in fulfilling a mission to be indispensable to the office of the CFO, and the consortium of investors led by Accel-KKR is committed to backing the company to deliver on that mission.”