As per a 2024 Rightworks survey, accounting firms were seen struggling to adopt high-tech solutions, with 88% of such businesses believing tech has had a positive impact on their efficiency, while 60% were suffering from disconnected systems, inconsistent processes, and a lack of standardised workflows.
There are start-ups which are trying to help accounting firms to adopt high-tech solutions and Aiwyn is one of them. Founded in 2020, the North Carolina-based venture sells software designed to address the revenue cycle side of the CPA (Certified Public Accountant) business.
Aiwyn’s platform automates and reconciles payments and invoices for both CPAs and their customers. In today’s episode of the “Start-up of the Week,” International Finance will talk about the venture in detail.
Knowing Things In Detail
Aiwyn was co-founded by entrepreneurs Pat Morell and Justin Adams. While building his first start-up, healthcare company Digitize.AI (which Morell also helped co-found), Adams had a bad experience with a CPA firm, as the latter sent him an invoice two months after he’d sold Digitize.AI, and reportedly wanted Adams to mail a check to a post office box in Pennsylvania.
The experience, however, gave Adams (and Morell), a good idea about what his next start-up will be and the result is Aiwyn, which, apart from possessing about 80 staffers by December 2024, notched USD 8 million in revenue in 2023, while serving around 130 of the top 500 accounting firms.
Aiwyn is developing what it describes as a “comprehensive” accounting practice management platform, as well as a tax-focused application. The start-up recently closed a USD 113 million funding round led by American private equity giant KKR and Bessemer Venture Partners. The round brought Aiwyn’s total raised to USD 127 million.
Aiwyn’s tagline reads, “Elevate Your Firm. Enhance Your Client Experience,” as the start-up, trusted by leading global accounting alliances like PrimeGlobal, RSM and Allinial Global, is empowering its clients to adopt automation, while saving time and costs.
The weapon here is the PracticeOS platform that unifies accounting firms’ tech stack for faster payment cycles, better revenue visibility, and a more enriched client experience.
Here Comes The Key Tech
Developed alongside CPA firms and forward-thinking technology experts, the start-up created the profession’s first open practice automation platform in the form of PracticeOS, which saves businesses time and drives revenue so their partners and staff can focus on client service.
PracticeOS has transformed itself into a modern, flexible, and integrated platform that helps firms automate manual processes and gain insight into their practice. No more rip-and-replace transitions, siloed data, or outdated client experiences. The start-up’s open infrastructure allows its clients to connect PracticeOS to their other systems and get a full view of their client’s data, eliminate inconsistencies, and provide clients with a cohesive experience.
The “PracticeOS Translation Engine” automatically updates records across the platform and to other integrated systems, saving time from manually checking records across disconnected systems.
Through PracticeOS, Aiwyn powers leading accounting firms with a smarter work-to-cash cycle. The tool’s “Payments and Collections” solution helps provide a better client experience and streamlines accounting firms’ collections process, integrating with their existing practice management system.
Their clients can see their entire AR (accounts receivable) in one view, where they can make online payments, set up recurring payments, save payment methods, and pay multiple invoices at once – even across multiple business entities, apart from automatically creating and sending statements that include all unpaid AR with a one-click option for their clients.
PracticeOS’ “Payments and Collections,” as a tool, ensures a secure and friction-free way for clients and firms to clear overdue balances and save time in payment, posting and data reconciliation. Firms can automatically create and send statements that include all unpaid AR with a one-click payment option for clients.
“Payments and Collections” automates away the manual tasks and awkward collections calls so firms get paid faster, with features like faster cash collection with online payments, ensuring improvement in client relationships, while addressing issues with custom dashboards.
Accounting firms don’t need to tap into their credit line and pay interest, while they can responsibly surcharge for credit card payments and processing fees, apart from enforcing and standardising late fees to align with best practices.
One Solution, Many Possibilities
Another feature of PracticeOS has been its “Engagement Letters,” which ensures a streamlined workflow to draft, send, execute, and renew engagements, thereby saving the CPA firms from the chaotic and time-consuming mess muddled in manual data entry with out-of-sync systems and templates stored in various places.
The solution empowers firms to standardise, optimise, and automate client engagement letters. Similar to “Payments & Collections,” the users can send engagement letters to clients with automated reminders so they can view and sign through the “Client Portal.”
The start-up enables a unified client experience by integrating with an accounting firm’s existing practice management and CRM systems, unlocking client and firm data, apart from simplifying the intake process for a better outcome for the company and its clients.
Aiwyn’s real-time data synchronisation eliminates duplication and other costly errors caused by manual processes, apart from facilitating annual renewals across all clients and letters with only a few clicks and fee increases dynamically.
Another feature of PracticeOS is its “Billing & AR Management.” CPAs want to serve clients, not labour over WIP (Work-In-Progress) analysis and debate write-downs. So WIP builds up, bills sit in draft instead of going out the door, and firms have to deal with the constant backlog. Most of Aiwyn’s customers see things like 10% of partner time lost on invoicing per month, growing frustration due to poor billing experiences and partners waiting 100 days to send clients an invoice after completing services.
“Billing & AR Management” addresses the above drawbacks by accelerating the process, ensuring accuracy, enhancing collaboration, and improving data accessibility. The start-up proactively drafts bills by pulling all relevant information into one place by gathering engagement letters, fee structures, past invoices, and more. It also effortlessly tracks billing changes and manages approval workflows between stakeholders promptly through streamlined processes and real-time collaboration.
Through the feature called “Project & Time,” Aiwyn’s PracticeOS powers leading accounting firms with efficient project and time management, by simplifying accounting project management and time tracking by integrating project tracking software and time tracking for accounting firms in a single, efficient platform. This solution combines every aspect of project management for accounting firms, eliminating the need for multiple tools, cumbersome spreadsheets, and manual tracking.