We are proud to partner with Bilendo , the SaaS provider that takes care of automated dunning for B2B companies. We spoke to one of the three founders, Florian Kappert.
Who are you and what do you do? Briefly introduce yourself and your company!
Who is your offer aimed at?My name is Florian Kappert and I am co-founder and managing director of Bilendo GmbH.
Bilendo is the first B2B SaaS provider to optimize the liquidity of companies and automate the entire dunning process. The self-onboarding service can be used by all companies immediately and without any technical setup. Bilendo helps all users to optimize the entire accounts receivable management and the administration of open items. The service starts immediately after the invoice is issued, imports all the necessary data via an interface or document recognition, automatically compares incoming payments from business accounts with outgoing invoices, sends the desired documents such as reminders and dunning notices by email and post, and informs users about the status of things with useful reports: If desired, all of this happens fully automatically.
For companies with many invoices, we reduce payment defaults and improve payment morale. Our Invoice CRM is a cloud platform and ensures more time, lower costs, higher liquidity and better creditworthiness with the daily process, rather than the usual monthly one. As the start-up solution of the year, Bilendo fits seamlessly into the existing IT and offers integrated solutions in the areas of dunning services, debt collection, factoring and credit insurance without us taking a percentage share of the claim.
Where did your idea for Bilendo come from?
From practice. Before Bilendo, we carried out many projects in the ERP and financial accounting areas and saw that the IT solutions were always based on old 1990s IT standards. We were sure that with the help of modern technologies we could develop process-supporting software that would help companies work more efficiently and grow faster.
What did you do before Bilendo? How do you go from business administration to programming?
I have been programming with Jakob since 1998. I have been self-employed since 2002 (because I was 18), I founded an agency in Munich in 2006 and then Bilendo from the agency in 2015. I always wanted to study business administration.
You’re still a relatively young company. What were the issues you struggled with most in the beginning? Your biggest challenge, so to speak?
This can be seen quite clearly in the conflict between Jakob and me. Jakob’s biggest problem is that we have customers. My biggest problem is that we always need more customers. The problem with existing customers is that new customers have different requirements than existing customers. As a SaaS provider, we are of course forced to offer a “one-fits-all” solution. This is quite difficult, but we sometimes manage it very well. This was also the reason why we decided to build Bilendo completely modularly. A flexible product for new and old customers. This makes development a little more complex but scaling easier.
In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges when it comes to digitalization and automation?
Companies must understand that all processes in the company must be aligned in such a way that the customer and their individual needs are the focus (customer centricity). This of course also applies to accounting, finance and risk management. In all areas, Bilendo is a good digitization tool thanks to its process compliance.
What experience has really amazed you on the way from founding the company to here?
How long it takes to sell enterprise software and at the same time how “nice” it is to win customers who stay customers. To date, Bilendo has not lost a single customer who started using Bilendo. That amazes us and makes us proud.
Were there things you had to consciously give up in order to be successful in your career?
No.
If you could dream: What else would you like to automate/digitize?
Walking the dog, cleaning the apartment, doing your taxes, shopping,…
