An Important Note
Understanding a Custom Vendor Landscape
- Info-Tech’s Custom Vendor Landscapes are custom deliverables that are built with a heavy emphasis on the use cases and selection criteria of the requesting client. They are intended to provide an external point-of-view on a smaller or niche software marketspace. They are built over the course of one week based on secondary research by one of our Software Selection Services analysts.
- These deliverables may be sanitized and published for convenient access by our other members; it is important to understand that they are not intended to be general market analysis reports like our SoftwareReviews Data Quadrants or Software Selection Guides.
- This report is bespoke to the client that requested it and is not intended to be an omnibus view of the entire marketspace (these deliverables are limited to ten vendors, and the vendor shortlist is often dictated in full or in part by the requestor).
- Please ensure that you are conducting your own due diligence on vendors within the space; the sanitized version of this report may be a helpful starting point for initial vendor shortlisting; the limitations of its scope and the highly custom nature of the vendor list and analysis contained within does not make it synonymous with the analysis in our omnibus market analysis research (SoftwareReviews Data Quadrants and Software Selection Guides).
Understanding the Current State
Objective
[Redacted] is looking for best-of-breed Billing Software. Must-have capabilities include the ability to support and integrate multiple product lines and different pricing models, SAP integration with flexible interoperability.
The incumbent platform is a combination of various purchased and in-house software, however there are concerns regarding consolidation, scalability and ability to deal with complex pricing structures.
The goals of these objectives aim towards easing the billing management process, while bringing uniformity across the business divisions.
Vendor Selection Criteria
In evaluating the market space for Billing Software, Info-Tech’s analysts looked at the following vendor attributes:
- Breadth and depth of capabilities for Billing Software.
- Vendor footprint (vendor market presence, vendor share of mind, vendor stability and long-term viability)
- Architecture and integration
- Customization potential and ease-of-use
- Affordability transparency
Selection Rigor Matters
“Modern billing software has come a long way, and in 2023, it’s set to meet the challenges of the next decade and beyond while ensuring accessibility for all sorts of growing businesses.” (Source: Small Business Trends)
Defining the Market
Market Definition
Billing Software is an essential partner to any growing organization. With the increase in digital payments, organizations need to efficiently manage transactions, receivables, and data, and billing platforms must be at the forefront.
Typical features of software in this space include invoicing, automated billing, integrations, reporting, information storage and price management.
The primary drivers for these software are ensuring smooth billing processes and dealing with custom client needs. With increasing complexities in pricing and growing transaction numbers, the focus has shifted to ensure strong customization and adaptability to the needs of different organizations and pricing models.
The chosen software must focus on providing a multi-functional and easy to use experience for a growing organization and service.
Key Trends
The quality of Billing Software has improved significantly with an increase in transaction management needs, with innovation focusing on driving a seamless user experience. Organizations must use the most advanced software to grow with in the long-term.
Some of the top trends impacting Billing Software for 2024:
- Product Bundling
- Cloud Platforms
- Customer-Centric Design
- AI Automation
23% CAGR — The global cloud billing software market will grow by 23% annually, with fastest growth in APAC. (2023-2029)
Source: Mordor Intelligence
Top Level Features
Feature Name |
Description |
| Transaction Details | Must be able to handle high transaction volumes, storing customizable and unique transaction details, transaction value pricing and data from multiple sources per product. |
| Pricing Management | Solution must support adding and management of unique and customized pricing models (subscription, usage based, hybrid), product lines, deals, price bundling, and linking fee schedule and pricing history. |
| Billing Calculations | Must support multiple transaction inputs, fee calculation given customer + transaction details, multiple layer support for billing, billing schedules and re-triggering billing runs. |
| Customer Management | Solution must support changing customer records, storing data, product allocation, customizable customer relationship hierarchy. |
| Invoice Management | Must be able to issue and reissue invoices, preventing changes to issued invoices, manual updates, integration with payment systems and automatic statements for deadlines and overdue payments. |
| Integrations | Must be able to integrate with SAP including S/4HANA while also being flexible with other platforms. Flexible and scalable mediation layer. |
| Customer Reporting | The platform must be able to communicate with clients effectively, with customizable invoice creation in PDF and communication being delivered and issuing credit notes. |
| User Experience | Must have strong, easy to use UI with minimal downtime and high levels of customizability, self-service user management with multiple users, access for internal/external users. |
| Reporting | The solution must provide internal reporting capabilities, with detailed analytics on billing, payment and revenue trends, incentives and discounts, and role-based management. |
Key Players
Info-Tech identified eleven platforms applicable to the use case. The platforms are listed in alphabetical order.
