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SoftCo for Manufacturing

Automating the Manufacturing Industry

The manufacturing industry poses unique challenges for finance teams due to the complex nature of operations and the diverse supplier network involved. Manufacturers often have multiple ordering systems and different spend categories, including materials, indirect expenses, and freight. Managing a large volume of transactions while accurately capturing data, processing invoices, and ensuring timely payments is critical for maintaining strong supplier relationships and enabling business growth. Over the last decade, SoftCo has worked with some of the largest organizations in the Manufacturing industry, including Sunny D, Analog Devices, and Logitech. SoftCoP2P for Manufacturing addresses the unique industry challenges and structures, streamlines, and automates the entire finance process from procurement to invoice automation and payment across all spend categories.

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Smart Matching, powered by AutoML Machine Learning, removes manual elements of invoice matching, resulting in an industry-leading 90% touchless invoice processing. Smart Coding and Smart Routing also utilize Machine Learning to automatically determine the correct routing and coding of invoices, resulting in 89% faster processing of non-PO invoices compared to manual environments. Surcharge processing is automated regardless of the way in which they are presented, reducing the time to process by 95%.

SoftCoP2P is truly global, handling multiple entities and multiple currencies in multiple languages. It eliminates maverick spending and delivers efficiencies, cost savings and 100% visibility & control over the entire procure to pay process. SoftCo Procure-to-Pay software boosts your key vendor relationships by providing an efficient onboarding process and full visibility over the status of their invoices. The solution enforces and optimizes pricing agreements with your preferred vendors. It also manages the request, purchase, and control of contract-based spend.

Benefits of SoftCoP2P for Manufacturing

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Automated
Inventory Management.

90% Straight Through
Invoice Processing.

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Improves Scalability
in Production.

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Enhances Supplier
Performance Tracking.

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Stronger
Forecasting Capabilities.

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89%
Cost Savings.

Case Study

Logitech
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“80% of our invoices are already achieving a 100% confidence level in the auto-match. This is a really big deal from an AP perspective.”

LOCATION

USA, EU, Asia

REVENUE

$5bn per annum

INVOICES PER ANNUM

100,000

Key Challenges

Logitech is internationally renowned for its wide variety of products for personal computing, gaming, video conferencing, and digital home-entertainment control.

Logitech faced challenges with their OCR system as it struggled to accurately detect foreign languages. Out of 23 companies, their OCR could only be applied successfully to 2 of them. Additionally, Logitech experienced significant delays in invoice processing.

Solutions & Results

SoftCo offers Logitech comprehensive end-to-end AP automation, encompassing automated capture, matching, and approval for over 100,000 annual supplier invoices. SoftCoAP’s versatility shines through its multi-currency and multi-entity capabilities, enabling Logitech to efficiently automate processes across all 23 of its Asian companies. With SoftCo Analytics, Logitech’s accounts payable team gains complete control and visibility over the entire AP process.

  • 83% Touchless Invoice Processing.
  • Multi-currency & multi-entity.

How SoftCoP2P for Manufacturing works

Streamlined Vendor Management

SoftCo Vendor Management delivers the benefits of working efficiently with preferred Vendors. Purchasing is optimized, costs reduced, and administration is eliminated. The cloud-based solution ensures Vendors have full online visibility of all orders and invoices and queries and disputes are addressed immediately.

Superior Smart Coding

SoftCo non-PO invoice handling reduces processing time by up to 90%, with industry leading compliance and audit checks. SoftCo Non-PO Smart Coding intelligently identifies and learns coding patterns allowing it to automatically code invoices, saving time and eliminating error.

Agile and Efficient eProcurement

SoftCo eProcurement (electronic procurement software) ensures a quick and efficient purchasing process for all operational spend, in full compliance with your organization’s procurement policies. SoftCo eProcurement software streamlines capital, recurring and operational spend.

Accelerated Invoice Approval workflow

SoftCo Accounts Payable Automation delivers an accelerated, secure invoice approval process with configurable automated workflows. With multiple verifiers and approvers, invoices are routed for approval, automated email notifications are sent, followed by reminders. Un-actioned invoices are routed to an alternative approver, ensuring minimal process delay. 

Fully Integrated Contract Compliance

SoftCo Contract Compliance closely integrates with all SoftCo P2P modules. It manages the request, purchase and control of contract-based spend within eProcurement and facilitates contract and invoice matching within AP with comprehensive reports. The solution alerts you for contract expiry or renewals. All contracts and supporting information are stored in the SoftCo Compliant Archive. 

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Single Payment Workflow

SoftCoPay transforms payments from a cost center to a profit center by reducing costs, earning rebates, mitigating payment risk, and optimizing payment type. Payments are streamlined into an easy to use workflow. The seamless process, from receipt of invoice to vendor payment, delivers control and transparency with straightforward reconciliation through your ERP and a fully auditable payment process.

Precise Invoice Data Capture

SoftCo Accounts Payable Automation captures all invoice data, regardless of the format received from your Vendors, using advanced Data Capture technology or via SoftCo’s outsource data capture service. Processing times are improved, and keying errors eliminated.

100% Control of Project Spend

SoftCo Pre-Approved Spend functionality enables a seamless drawdown on pre-agreed budgets and the generation of purchase orders for spend with preferred vendors, without delay. Department budgets are not exceeded and spend with your vendors is controlled.

Unrivalled Invoice Matching

The SoftCo Matching Engine uses advanced RPA technology removing all manual elements of invoice matching, delivering an error-free, efficient process for all invoice types. The SoftCo Smart Matching engine applies Machine Learning technology to even the most complicated matching scenarios, such as incomplete data, missing product codes, and FX conversions to deliver 90% match rates.

Powerful Reporting and AI Analytics

SoftCo delivers industry leading analytics to empower organizations to make informed decisions. SoftCoP2P offers both SoftCo Advanced Analytics, part of the SoftCo solution, and the ability to integrate with 3rd party analytics tools. The platform provides accurate, real-time information over AP productivity, invoice processing rates and payments performance.

Financial Management: From Theory to Practice

Industry-leading innovative AutoML Matching Engine

SoftCo AutoML Machine Learning

SoftCo’s unique AutoML Machine learning automates the time-consuming and iterative tasks associated with Invoice Automation, delivering unparalleled savings for the customer, with full auditability and control.

Utilizing millions of real data from Industry, Operations, Organizations, and Suppliers, the SoftCo AutoML Machine Learning engine ‘learns’ and improves based on 250+ match ‘patterns’ and applies this automation to SoftCo Smart Matching models, including tolerance, aggregation, and confidence match criteria. SoftCo AutoML uses real-time dynamic data. Instead of relying on stale static data, the engine learns immediately every time an invoice finishes processing, constantly improving automation customized to the specific organization.

Machine Learning (ML) is a game-changer in automating both PO and Non-PO invoicing, with full transparency and auditability. Manual invoice processing can cost $16 per invoice, whereas high invoice automation, driven by AutoML reduces processing costs by over 90%. The same ML technology is applied to the coding and routing of invoices, which are optimized by AutoML based on continuous learned patterns.

The results are unrivaled, and the savings exceptional. SoftCo delivers 90% straight through processing for PO invoices and 89% faster processing of Non-PO invoices.

solutions ap auto match summary
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“In my 45+ years in the workplace, the SoftCo project
is the best implementation experience I’ve had.”

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SoftCo SmartConnect seamlessly integrates with over 200 ERP’s

Seamless, secure and timely integration with the Finance system or ERP is a key part of any P2P or AP Automation solution. Integrating your ERP with SoftCo will expand its capabilities, making it a more powerful business tool than ever before. SoftCo SmartConnect is a secure, highly configurable cloud based platform which manages all of the data exchange between the ERP and SoftCo. SoftCo integrates seamlessly with existing ERP systems at a single point, thus offering access to real-time information and data.

SoftCo SmartConnect has seamlessly integrated with over 200 ERP’s including Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, Infor, Sage and multiple industry specific and even bespoke ERP’s.

Additional Resources

eBook

Automating Accounts Payable for Retail

Retail organizations are encountering industry-specific challenges. Learn how automation can resolve the significant challenges of manual AP processes and the value it adds to the retail supply chain.

Read More

On-Demand Webinar

The Rise of Surcharges & How to Manage Them

Learn how SoftCoAP simplifies and accelerates the process of capturing and accounting for different types of surcharges, to ensure accuracy over the true costs of goods and materials.

Watch Now

Blog

7 Key Accounts Payable Metrics That Matter to Your CEO

Here we run-through 7 important accounts payable performance metrics that can be monitored to ensure that your AP department is running both efficiently and effectively.

Read More

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