Saas-based accounting platform Zoho Books has eyes on world markets

Zoho, which so far was focused on India, is expanding its footprint in countries such as Latin America, Mexico and Africa

Zoho Corporation, the SaaS-based global technology company, is aggressively taking its online accounting platform, Zoho Books, to international markets. Company executives said that its Zoho finance platform had grown 80 per cent in India, while globally, it has grown by 50 per cent year-on-year. This growth is led by Zoho Books.

Zoho, which was focused on India, is expanding its footprint in Latin America, Mexico and Africa. "Our strategy of growth in any market has been organic. This also means we had to adopt a strategy, which was different from other competition. One thing that really worked for us was our focus on creating a suite of products," explained Sivaramakrishnan Iswaran, global head of Zoho Finance and Operation Suite.

The finance and account segment has seen a huge shift owing to compliance requirements and the impact of the pandemic on businesses. "Traditionally the finance or accounting teams in a firm are the most taken-for-granted team. Either they are very small, and everything is managed manually," said Iswaran.

Two aspects that have given a huge spurt to the adoption of Zoho Books were the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) and the discontinuation of Intuit's Quickbooks from the Indian market.

"But more importantly in a recent survey we conducted on our customer base found that 75 per cent of the businesses were able to collect payments on time, follow up with customers automatically, and improve cash flow with Zoho Books," added Iswaran.

Zoho Books is the company's GST-compliant cloud accounting software, and also present in 13 country-specific tax editions. According to the company, over 350 businesses in India use Zoho Books. Zoho Finance Platform supports more than half a million businesses across 160 countries.

So far, cloud-based accounting systems have been popular with the SME segment, but Iswaran points out that many enterprises are also approaching the company for Zoho Books. "One of the features we in-built with our suite is interoperability. One of the reasons enterprises are approaching is because now they can integrate account receivables and collections and other accounting and finance features into their SAP or other software," he explained.

Zoho recently announced that it had crossed $1 billion in revenue and planned to open 100 network PoPs (point of presence) worldwide in the next five years to provide users with a faster network. The company has businesses in over 150 countries and has built a user base of over 80 million in the last 25 years of operations.

Zoho's annual revenue in India increased by 77 per cent in 2021. The company is seeing uptake of products across different categories, with the top five offerings in India being Zoho One (the operating system for business), CRM Plus (customer experience platform), EX offering—led by Zoho People (human resource management platform) and Zoho Workplace (enterprise collaboration platform), and the finance suite led by Zoho Books (GST-compliant accounting software).

Survey results of businesses using Zoho:

• Increase in cash flow: 75 per cent of the businesses were able to collect payments on time, follow up with customers automatically, and improve cash flow with Zoho Books.
• Real-time visibility: 85 per cent of the businesses were able to improve their performance owing to the real-time visibility and business insights offered by Zoho Books.
• Enhanced business performance: 70 per cent of the businesses were able to see a growth of up to 40 per cent in revenue yoy after using Zoho Books.
• Automation and saving time: 85 per cent of the businesses found that they were able to save up to 10 hours per week, while the remaining 15 per cent were able to save more than 10 hours with Zoho Books compared to a traditional alternative like a legacy-based system.

Benefits of cloud-based accounting solutions for CAs, as revealed in a survey done with 150 Chartered Accountants in November 2022 who had registered for the WCOA:

• Enhanced efficiency: 88 per cent of the respondents said that cloud accounting solutions help them save up to 10 hours per week compared to traditional methods of accounting.
• Compliance readiness: 89 per cent of the respondents said cloud accounting solutions solve the challenges in complying with regional tax and regulatory laws for businesses and their own firms.  
• Increase in value-added services: More than 85 per cent of the respondents stated that cloud accounting solutions help them in performing essential accounting tasks, which gives them additional time to offer advisory services to their clients.
• Improved collaboration: 85 per cent of the CAs surveyed believe that cloud accounting solutions improved collaboration and help them work with clients and finance teams in real time.