Irish company Celtrino, formerly known as Celerity, is to double its workforce to 50 people as it moves to take at advantage of international demand for more integrated business processes between trading partners.
The new positions will be created across a range of functions, from software development and customer care to marketing and sales.
Established since 1990 and currently employing 25 people, Celtrino has built a very successful business to date, providing a suite of software applications that automate many of the business processes around the entire trading cycle, including pricing, ordering, delivering, accounts payable, accounts receivable and statements/remittances.
Celtrino currently processes in excess of 16 million invoices annually through its Celtrino platform. Among its 600 customers are leading brands such as the Musgrave Group, BWG Foods, Unilever, Campbell Catering, Beaumex, HSE, Pat the Baker, Londis Group and Gala Retail Services.
One recent study conducted by the European Commission, estimates that companies using electronic and automated invoice processes can achieve savings of 80pc over their postal counterparts.
Yet the same study highlights electronic invoices currently constitute only 5pc of total invoice volume in Europe. Given the roughly 14 billion business-to-business invoices that are currently not being sent electronically, the projected savings would add up to nearly €260bn per year – about 2pc of EU GDP, according to CapGemini, Deutsche Bank Research.
Seeking to take advantage of this enormous growth potential, Ken Halpin, managing director of the newly branded Celtrino, said: “In these recessionary times, it is more important than ever that public and private sector businesses adopt a smarter way of doing business with each other, in order to drive value efficiencies and cost savings.
“One area where there is obviously still significant scope and opportunity to reduce costs is in supply chain document automation. Our experience is that many organisations now see the business case for deploying an automated system to handle the huge volumes of paper-based commercial transactions that take place on a daily basis both within and between companies.
“In addition, our Software-as-a-Service(SaaS) delivery model enables both the public and private sectors to avail of these services at a fraction of the cost of implementing an in-house system.
“Our rebrand to Celtrino and our jobs expansion plan send out a positive signal that we are building for the future, securely connecting with our customers, and moving into a new exciting phase of growth for the company, where we will be seeking to break into new industry sectors and international markets.”
Some of the industry sectors earmarked by Celtrino include targeting the FMCG, retail, healthcare, pharmaceutical, entertainment and manufacturing industry, together with the public sector.
Halpin notes that by adopting e-invoicing and the rollout of electronic supply chain administration, the public sector can play a significant part in supporting a more cost competitive ‘smart economy’.
Currently only six of the 27 member states of the EU have made it mandatory for public sector organisations to trade electronically with constituent private sectors, namely, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Spain, Greece and Italy.
Halpin called on the Irish government to take the initiative, streamline our public procurement processes and make electronic trading mandatory.
