The judging panel of senior finance professionals singled out the fruitful relationship between the scale-up company and the world leader, particularly Sidetrade’s standout innovation, and its ability to deliver finance transformation that adds greater value to the business.
Sidetrade was recognised for enabling Inmarsat to achieve significant business success on the order-to-cash process and collecting cash faster in the past twelve months through its AI technology.
Using machine learning and natural language processing, Sidetrade helps businesses accelerate cash generation and improve working capital. The future of finance is around automation and standardisation, which is welcomed by finance teams. It means that finance team members are focused on having conversations with suppliers and customers, which is much more valuable and most likely more interesting for the individuals as well.
David Turner, chief marketing officer at Sidetrade, said:
“We are grateful to the CFO Summit for this recognition, and I would like to personally thank Inmarsat Director Global Credit Management Andrea Baker for the great working partnership we have. Shared service centres are prime examples of how enterprises can combine the right technology with their data and processes to make a big impact on the business. Today’s award celebrates this achievement by Inmarsat, the leader in its field, and I hope will encourage more and more global enterprises to look at AI and give Sidetrade a call.”
Alongside Inmarsat, Sidetrade brings AI to a range of additional top-tier customers including: Euro Car Parts, GFK Europe, Univar, Frank Recruitment Group, Customade Group, Rexel, Chubb, Bunzl, Atkins, Hearst Magazines, Inchcape, VF Northern Europe, Samworth Brothers, KPMG, and more.
This is the second consecutive year that Sidetrade has earned a coveted spot in the Top 500. This list highlights independent French businesses who achieved the most solid growth over the last three years (2015-2018).
“We are indeed proud to once again rank among the Top 500 Growth Champions in France. I wish to thank and congratulate our teams for this renewed achievement. Our Artificial Intelligence technology is used every day, by an increasing number of large companies, to significantly grow revenue and accelerate cashflow. Being at the epicenter of this revolution is a great opportunity for Sidetrade, and is highly motivating for all of our staff”, said Olivier Novasque, CEO of Sidetrade.
In January, Sidetrade announced double-digit growth for the fifth consecutive fiscal year, and a historic 88% increase in backlog. Sidetrade’s AI is now used in 80 countries by 2,700 businesses in every industry.
Financial services consulting firm TriFinance Netherlands has signed a partnership with AI firm Sidetrade. This partnership, which brings together the expertise of TriFinance and Sidetrade’s leading AI Aimie solution, will help companies in the Netherlands better manage the complex order-to-cash process and increasingly challenging customer payment behavior, enabling organisations to focus on productivity and customer satisfaction.
Leon Harinck, business unit financial management services leader at TriFinance Netherlands, said:
While searching for the best credit management software, we identified Sidetrade as the market leader with Aimie, its AI, adjusting credit management workflows in real time depending on the of the size of the team, automating tasks and recommending the best action at the best time. There was also a great cultural fit with strong skill sets and resources, so the collaboration is very pleasant and dynamic.
AI technology transforms businesses, with the rise of automation and predictive analytics on customer behavior. To successfully address escalating sources of customer data and increasing IT system complexity, financial teams need to swiftly evolve their Accounts Receivable management and technologies.
Sunil Pandit, partner and alliance lead at Sidetrade, said:
We are excited to be working with TriFinance Netherlands to offer to their customers ground-breaking credit management technology to make order-to-cash as seamless and effective as possible. The new partnership will enable Dutch companies to accelerate cashflow generation, and to achieve their overall business objectives by predicting customer payment behavior and increasing their productivity.
Located across 6 offices in Europe, Sidetrade has 20 years’ experience in the world of order-to-cash, and uses machine learning, natural language processing, automation, and an unrivalled data lake of 313 million B2B financial transactions worth 950 billion Euros, to deliver measurable results for its clients.
| SIDETRADE (MILLION EUROS) |
2019 | 2018 | VARIATION (%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Q1 REVENUE | 6.0 | 5.3 | + 14% |
| Q2 REVENUE | 6.6 | 5.6 | + 16% |
| Q3 REVENUE | 6.4 | 5.5 | + 17% |
| Q4 REVENUE | 6.7 | 5.7 | + 18% |
| LIKE-FOR-LIKE ANNUAL REVENUE | 25.7 | 22.1 | + 17% |
| B2C SERVICES | – | 2.0 | – |
| ANNUAL REVENUE | 25.7 | 24.1 | + 7% |
2019 was Sidetrade’s fifth consecutive year of double-digit growth. Sidetrade’s annual revenue totaled €25.7m, representing remarkable organic growth of 17%, vs. 2018, like for like. Let us recall that Sidetrade revenue no longer includes B2C Services, since this business line was phased out, as announced in 2018.
This phenomenal sales growth was buoyed by the core Financials AI business, which reached €21.3m in 2019, up 17%. This acceleration reflects the attractiveness of the latest release of the Financials AI platform. Sales & Marketing AI activity is also growing steadily, up 17% in 2019.
In 2019, the booked Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) from new customers shot up 88%, hitting a record level of €4.8m in new annual subscriptions, vs. €2.6m in 2018. This gives good visibility of Sidetrade’s revenue growth in 2020 and beyond. In fact, mean initial contract period for these new customers is 41.1 months.
Key account ARR performance was even more spectacular, reaching a record of €4.2m in annual subscriptions, vs. €2m in 2018, up 113%. This record stemmed largely from the core Financials AI business, with a whopping 295% rise to €3.8m in new ARR, vs. €1m in 2018. Many prestigious new customers signed up with Sidetrade in 2019, boosting strength in its main sales territories:
Three factors explain this outstanding growth: 1) The capacity of Aimie, Sidetrade’s AI platform, to augment dramatically operational performance; 2) Market dynamics demanding new ways of boosting productivity; and 3) Sidetrade’s high sales efficiency.
Today, more and more businesses are turning to Artificial Intelligence, because of its capacity to handle huge amounts of customer data so effectively, resulting in lower processing costs and better customer relations. For Finance, cutting-edge machine learning can process massive volumes of invoices, and customize the order-to-cash process based on AI analysis of customer payment behavior.
Since 2017, Aimie has been learning from Sidetrade’s exclusive cloud containing over 300 million payment experiences (transactions worth €953bn), and continuously improving. Aimie’s cash collection recommendations have proven 53% more effective than human decisions alone. In addition, Aimie has cut wasted actions (those not resulting in payment) by 51%, freeing up operational staff for value-added tasks.
Gartner, a leading research and advisory company, explains that robotic process automation spread in 2019, as companies sought to improve operational efficiency and integrate digital systems in new processes (source: 2019 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Robotic Process Automation Software). Artificial Intelligence perfectly meets these needs, especially in shared service centers, which are a real mega-trend in large enterprises.
2019 was a great year for sales, especially in France, the UK and the US, proving the value of the investments made to increase the sales capacity.
The global software market for Sidetrade’s Financials AI is expected to exceed $3bn, according to a survey by Research and Markets. As Finance increasingly moves towards digitalization, Sidetrade is well-positioned to conquer this new market, thanks to a technological lead and a highly effective sales force.
Sidetrade is confident in their ability to sustain double-digit growth in 2020.
Solocal, the French leader in digital advertising and marketing, is mature in terms of managing account receivables. Today, they are undertaking new strategic challenges in Finance. Their mission is twofold: digitalize, optimize and fluidify financial relations with 399,000 clients; and bolster cooperation between Finance and other departments in the company to improve management of claims and disputes.
With Sidetrade, we get proven, robust AI technology, which boosts our productivity and enhances the client experience.” , says Olivier Regnard, Chief Finance Officer of Solocal. “The partnership with Sidetrade should enable us to improve our recovery, reduce the amount of arrears, and digitalize the customer journey up to payment.”
We are proud to support Solocal’s new management team with this ambitious transformation program. Through this partnership, we are contributing to bringing teams together on a project of growth”, said Olivier Novasque, CEO of Sidetrade.
Sidetrade’s AI Financials solution provides a shared 360° view of the customer, ensuring smooth collaboration amongst the different teams involved in the order-to-cash process. Aimie, Sidetrade’s Artificial Intelligence platform, analyzes over 313 million payment experiences stored in its cloud, and automatically recommends the best strategies for managing late payers. Each day, Aimie automatically prioritizes practical account follow-up actions for teams, specifying the best time and the best channel to contact the customer.
On average, Aimie’s recommendations are 53% more effective at getting payment within five days, vs. conventional choices made by humans. Additionally, Aimie cuts useless tasks which waste the collection team’s time, by up to 51%. This huge gain in productivity enables the team to focus on added value through greater contact time with customers.
In terms of reducing the cash collection period, Randstad Belgium has taken a leap ahead by choosing Sidetrade. Since 2013 they have been using Sidetrade’s technology to digitalize and automate their financial processes. In fact, their Finance department has observed a four day drop in days sales outstanding.
Today, with enhanced data processing, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is playing an ever-greater role in companies, giving clear information in real time on the state of the business, and providing support to make the best decisions. New areas are ripe for intelligent automation including personalized client relations for Finance, automated processing of invoices, and anticipation of client behavior.
We are going through a revolution, where our AI technology, using deep learning, and working in unison with CRM and ERP systems, rationalizes business processes, makes work easier for people, and improves performance. Randstad Belgium joined this revolution by selecting Aimie, Sidetrade’s Artificial Intelligence assistant, to boost the performance of their teams”, said Jean-Cyril Schütterlé, Chief Product Officer of Sidetrade.
To deal with an impressive increase in sales (€1.5bn) and a corresponding jump in the number of invoices, Randstad Belgium has decided to use Aimie (Sidetrade AI) for fast, reliable decision-making support.
Trained on 313 million B2B payment experiences totaling over €953bn over the last three years, Aimie will analyze each Randstad Belgium client in real time to determine the best follow-up strategy. Aimie will consider objectives set by the Finance department, and all available criteria such as buyer profile, billing characteristics, and the history of the relationship including any disputes.
Aimie frees up staff from time-consuming collection tasks, automatically adjusts workflows according to client-specific payment behavior, and assigns the most complex cases to staff depending on workload. The actions recommended by Aimie are 53% more effective than conventional decisions made by the human mind alone. Moreover, Aimie cuts useless tasks by 51%, allowing staff to focus their expertise on the most important disputes and spend more time developing human relations with clients.
Rudy Lathouwers, Director of Administration, Randstad Belgium, had this to say:
We are looking forward to the rollout of Aimie in the context of the digitalization of our processes. This AI system will help us optimize our relations with our small and medium-sized clients. With Aimie on board, our credit controller staff are going to be able to concentrate on key account management, which is more complex.”
Sidetrade also won ‘Best use of AI in a Financial Application, specifically for its Aimie AI software for finance, which helps businesses improve their working capital by augmenting cash collection and reducing days sales outstanding, thanks to AI predictions and recommendations.
Commenting on the news, Mark Sheldon, CTO at Sidetrade, said:
Thank you to the judges for recognizing the quality of Sidetrade’s AI -Aimie- and the transformative impact it has on our clients; when it comes to enhancing B2B sales, marketing and cash collection.
I also extend my congratulations to all those who had their achievements recognized at this year’s awards, it is great honor to be acknowledged alongside these other leaders in the field of AI.”
The news was announced on Sunday 6th November 2019, along with 51 winners across seven categories.
The judging panel included Dr Andy Pardoe, founder of Informed.AI; Aaron K. Baughman, distinguished engineer and master inventor within IBM GBS Interactive Experience; and Dr Janet Bastiman, Chief science officer and AI venture partner at MMC Ventures.
Founded in 2015, Awards.AI is part of the Informed.AI Media Group, which runs a number of community websites supporting the field of Artificial Intelligence. Previous award winners include Cisco, Microsoft, and BT.
To make the most of CRM, businesses must first ensure that customer data is as accurate and as extensive as possible. This is a recurrent challenge, and it is daunting for most companies. Not only does Sidetrade supply highly enriched firmographic data but, most importantly, Aimie collects and analyzes over 50 billion business signals from corporate websites and social networks, giving Salesforce users custom information and insights they can count on to get results.
Aimie can gain a deep understanding of how existing customers behave. She targets the best leads among millions of potential customer companies, and recommends an enhanced way of reaching them directly through Salesforce.
Every step of the way – transforming leads, increasing customer spend, and increasing retention rate– Marketing & Sales directors can now harness the amazing power of Sidetrade’s AI on AppExchange”, explains Jean-Cyril Schütterlé, Chief Product Officer at Sidetrade. “With Sidetrade, sales and marketing teams can act immediately to seize previously unseen opportunities. Sidetrade AI on AppExchange is an invaluable decision-making tool, supporting staff with crucial information such as business development opportunities, and which customers are statistically at risk of leaving you. With predictive analyses at your fingertips, you can deal with issues before they arise and accelerate revenue growth.”
Sidetrade AI Sales & Marketing is a welcome addition to AppExchange, as they power digital transformation for customers with AI-driven business insights,” said Woodson Martin, GM of Salesforce AppExchange. “AppExchange is constantly evolving to enable our partners to build cutting-edge solutions to drive customer success”.
One of David’s first responsibilities at Sidetrade will be to build a global marketing team focused on world-class demand generation and product marketing to support the company’s international growth. Commenting on his appointment, David Turner says:
I’ve joined Sidetrade at a really exciting time, with our reputation well established as a leader in leveraging AI to transform the order-to-cash process of major enterprises worldwide. Now Sidetrade is embarking on the next stage of growth, with our sights set on new markets, and generating business value for our current and future clients and their customers. I’ll be building a world-class marketing operation to drive our global success.”
At Oracle Netsuite, David headed up marketing and demand generation in EMEA. He took his team from four to 30 strong, setting up new operations across 11 countries. His achievements include supporting the sales team to increase annual revenue significantly through both direct and indirect channels. “It’s an achievement I’m very proud of”, he says. David acted as the key spokesperson, turning technological capabilities and product functionality into compelling business solutions. He hopes the experience will prove useful when it comes to explaining the value of AI in an easy-to-understand way for business leaders.
David also brings entrepreneurial experience, having conceived and helped to develop FinancialForce, a cloud software start-up, while at Coda and Unit4 NV, as well as running a number of businesses outside of the tech industry.
The experience of taking a business from idea to reality is something I find fascinating and rewarding, and it feeds into my thinking and leadership today”, says David.
