Payables automation scale-up wil invest an estimated £100m over a five year period in the region, as it opens European headquarters in London following impressive growth in North America 

Tipalti, the leading global payables automation platform, announces expansion into Europe with the opening of a London office - delivering the UK's first solution that automates the entire accounts payable (AP) process, while also executing global payments.

The unicorn, valued at $2 billion+, launches in the market following 83% YoY growth in North America. It estimates to invest £100m over a five year period, marking a key milestone in its international expansion. Tipalti helps high-velocity businesses eradicate manual payables processes - the most time-consuming function in the finance department - and has more than 1,500 customers including Amazon Twitch, National Geographic, Business Insider, Farmdrop, Hopin, Cazoo and Time Out.  

Tipalti’s cloud-based solution has been fully localised for the UK - helping high-growth businesses streamline AP processes and execute global payments. Its end-to-end AP offering addresses the entire workflow, including supplier management, VAT compliance, procurement, invoice management, PO matching, self-billing, global payments, payment reconciliation and more. Its FCA-approved e-money licence gives businesses the ability to manage domestic and cross-border payments, and FX conversion within the holistic payables platform.

As UK businesses continue to grapple with the challenges brought about by the pandemic and Brexit, Tipalti launches at a critical time to allow finance teams to step away from manual financial operations, and focus on strategic initiatives to help businesses survive and thrive. New research from Tipalti supports this - revealing UK CFOs admit the pandemic (27%), and rapidly changing regulations and legislation (25%) are two of the top three things that have made their role more complex. And when asked how their role had changed in the last two years, over a quarter (27%) said they have increased responsibility to find new revenue growth, productivity and profitability opportunities, yet have more manual financial operations work (29%). 

Tipalti Europe, which has opened offices in central London, will create 200+ UK jobs over the next three years, with over 40 hires across engineering, sales, customer success, compliance, and more filled by the end of 2021. It has already seen great traction in the market with over 50 customers. Adding the UK-based subsidiary to the Tipalti group allows it to focus on the market and expand its solutions, including regulated payment services, before expanding to other countries in Europe.

Europe’s fastest growing start-up Hopin, the event technology platform, has seen tremendous growth recently, helping its customers host immersive virtual, hybrid and in-person event experiences. Melissa Richards, Senior Accounts Payable Analyst at Hopin said: “The pandemic sparked a high demand for virtual events across the globe. This resulted in the finance team at Hopin manually processing lots of international payments - it was time consuming and complicated. We knew we needed a solution that would be able to scale with us and give us the visibility and overview needed to help grow the business. Tipalti has future-proofed our processes. Since we synced all our solutions in one bundle, we don’t have any manual intervention. Our workflow is quick and easy with all our payment processes in one central location - the days of juggling different systems and exporting files are long gone! With the implementation of Tipalti, we can continue to scale and not have to add more headcount to keep up.”

Committed to helping more high-velocity businesses in the UK, Tipalti moved its CMO of over seven years, Robert Israch, from San Francisco to London, to lead its European business as General Manager. Israch commented on Tipalti’s UK launch: “There’s a clear need and benefit for Tipalti’s technology in the UK. We know the strong desire for businesses in the market to scale, in fact almost a third (28%) of UK CEOs said international growth is a top priority in 2021 and beyond. However, time-consuming manual finance processes and piecemeal solutions are holding them back. We want to change this.

“We know, now more than ever, and in this current climate, finance teams need to be empowered with great technology that modernises finance departments and provides finance leaders with greater visibility and control. Tipalti’s scalable solution is purpose built to help businesses achieve their ambitious growth plans and meet changing needs, whilst also managing the major payables and financial operations challenges brought with this.”

Earlier this year, IDC MarketScape Named Tipalti a Worldwide Leader in mid market accounts payable automation. Kevin Permenter, research manager, Enterprise Applications at IDC said, “Finance teams that have enhanced visibility, flexibility, and agility in these uncertain times will find themselves well-positioned for future growth. The accounts payable function can be complex and fraught with inefficiencies for companies of all sizes. Automating AP is an essential element of any CFO’s strategy to modernise the finance organisation and focus on enabling business success. Tipalti’s robust solution prioritises efficiency across an end-to-end global payables workflow and supports AP and payment management in one cloud platform—helping finance scale and adapt to their business’ changing needs.”