Tradeshift, the online B2B networking specialist announced that it is partnering with the company that processes the 30,000 daily invoices generated by the United Kingdom’s National Health Service. The Shared Business Services unit of the NHS will adopt Tradeshift’s platform, which will connect hospitals, pharmacies and surgery centers with their suppliers.
Quoted in Computer Weekly, NHS SBS director of finance Simon Murphy said, “conceptually no one can argue with e-invoicing … nobody we’ve spoken to has not seen the sense in it.”
In addition to creating greater efficiencies by eliminating paper invoicing, the goal of the partnership is to help shorten the time it takes to get NHS suppliers paid. This echoes what Tradeshift CEO and co-founder Christian Lanng said during his FinovateSpring appearance in 2012, highlighting the fact that too many companies are going bankrupt because their customers fail to pay.
And while this specific issue may be less of a challenge for Britain’s National Health Service – or for some of Tradeshift’s other sizable customers like DHL, Intuit, and the government of France – it does underscore how technology can help solve problems of higher credit costs, lengthening payment terms, and access to funding.