Invoice Gateway
Project background
Invoice Gateway aims to bring value to both sides by solving the problem of last-minute payments, avoidance of blocking access to funds, and offering new payment options. The solution offered by this product is dedicated to those who handle large-sum orders.
The benefit for the buyer comes from the possibility of submitting an invoice repayment offer on different terms after receiving the invoice from the seller.
Buyer may, for example, propose to repay the invoice immediately (and not after the final repayment date), but by the amount reduced by a proposed percent, or present other possible repayment options. The buyer can individually modify such an offer.
How can the seller take advantage of it? For every seller, the constant availability of funds is crucial. Using the example of selling products, the seller often waits for the buyer to complete a money transfer to have funds for stocking up, carrying out new orders, or investing in the company's development.
Invoice Gateway gives the possibility to receive payment earlier due to the system of negotiating the price and repayment dates. Invoice Gateway offers more than that, but this was phase one of the product introduced in the MVP.
Invoice Gateway is a web platform. It optimizes the discounting and billing process. It brings value to each party engaged in the transaction. Suppliers can get paid before the due date. Buyers can get a decent return on invested cash.
FinTech industry
The primary purpose of FinTech technology is to help companies of all sizes, as well as customers and business owners, enhance their management of financial processes and operations through automation and specialized software.
The global FinTech market is predicted to reach $332.5 billion by the year 2028 at a CAGR of 19.8%.
The FinTech landscape is vast and collects solutions for many aspects of finance. Based on the type of application, the FinTech solution market is segmented into loans, insurance & personal finance, wealth management, and payment & fund transfer. The Invoice Gateway product fits into the last category.
The Invoice Gateway platform is an example of a tool that incorporates modern technologies to deliver the best solution to end users and considers their needs while designing the product. It offers optimization of the billing process for issued invoices.
Payment processing delays within a supply chain can significantly impact a company's cash flow, disrupting its business growth and operations. Invoice Gateway helps buyers and sellers get the most out of working capital along the supply chain by providing early payment to suppliers and allowing buyers to extend payment terms on the other hand.
Such solutions shorten the invoice payment time on terms that are attractive to both parties, which in turn may positively impact the company's finances.
Tools that offer them require best-in-class infrastructure from day 1 to ensure customer satisfaction and profitability while being a secure tool, which was our customers' goal when developing the product.
Services used
Features
Creating offer templates
CFOs create offer templates that serve as a set of financial rules for creating offers regarding different invoice categories.
Creating offers
Based on offer templates and financial documents like invoices Invoice Gateway matches financial rules for each invoice. Integration with OCR service makes this process fast and seamless.
Accepting offers
Buyers can choose from different financial offer variants delivered by Sellers and get their money much quicker under transparent conditions.
Scope of work
We made the whole MVP from scratch, modeling the entire process and carefully selecting essential features at every stage of development. Thanks to the careful feature-choosing process during refinements, we delivered the product faster, within only 4 months.
We created this web application based on React and Node.js, both on the front and backend sides. We also used GraphQL, which allowed developers to access the full capabilities of their data from a single endpoint which also speeds up the development process. We integrated the product with public business information databases to get the most recent information about contractors.
Our role in this project was also to support the client in the process of selecting technologies and tools, enabling the implementation of the necessary features.
The final choice was based on careful research conducted by our developers, which was then discussed with the client, who actively participated in the entire project.
One such analysis concerned choosing the proper OCR (Optical Character Recognition) system, which enables users to scan a text document - an invoice - into an electronic computer file. Ultimately we chose the Comarch OCR system.
Another issue that had to be addressed was the authentication and authorization system choice. We were looking for a platform that would provide ready-made access management, secure identity checking solution, and login integrations and be easy to integrate to shorten the product development time. In this case, we decided to use Auth0.
Review of our work
Our goal was to develop a web platform in the FinTech area that optimizes the discounting and billing process. By engaging with LeanCode, the company successfully built the MVP from scratch and delivered the product ahead of schedule. LeanCode's transparency and excellent communication stood out.
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Key takeaways
- We created the system using a lean startup approach and focused on key functions at the beginning. Thanks to this approach, we could make a pivot at the end of the project dictated by new legal requirements.
- Having Node.js on the front and backend side gave us great flexibility regarding the frontend-backend workload balance. All developers could switch from the front to the backend side based on current business needs.
Additional value delivered
LeanCode supported the client in specifying the scope of MVP and led to the successful implementation of all of them. Additionally, LeanCode helped in selecting the solution for the Optical Character Recognition system that was based on our in-depth analysis of available solutions.
OCR integration
Robust infrastructure setup
Technical analysis of available tools
