Customer Success Story

Shareflex Invoice at the Spiegel Group

The SPIEGEL Group uses Microsoft 365 and Shareflex as a strategic cloud platform for business processes

“We were very lucky to go live with Shareflex Invoice during the Corona shutdown in Germany. This meant that we were able to check and approve invoices from the home office virtually overnight. Looking back, we were able to achieve the project goals for the financial accounting department: improved throughput times, more transparent processes and high user acceptance.”

Andreas Gippe, Head of Accounting, SPIEGEL Group

The headquarters of the Spiegel Group in Hamburg.

Digitisation of incoming invoice processing at the Spiegel Group

The wide range of services provided by the Spiegel Group means that it works with a number of different partners, resulting in a high volume of incoming invoices. All invoices are factually and arithmetically checked, approved and then posted and archived in SAP by the financial accounting department.

By using the Shareflex Invoice software from Portal Systems AG, it was possible to introduce a Microsoft Office 365-based solution for the approval processes of incoming invoice processing, including SAP integration, for the SPIEGEL Group and its various subsidiaries. As a result, a previously largely paper-based process was digitised. This has minimised invoice processing times and created greater transparency for invoices in circulation.

Challenge: Seamless SAP integration

The SPIEGEL Group has been using Microsoft Office 365 for a number of years and has deployed Microsoft’s cloud solution across its entire organisation. It also makes use of the platform’s many features, such as SharePoint Online, Teams, Office and OneDrive.

Until now, the audit-proof archiving of incoming invoices used to take place after paper-based invoice verification. The aim was to enable auditors and approvers to check and approve incoming invoices digitally. So the obvious choice was a hybrid Microsoft Office 365 and SAP solution.

The SPIEGEL Group is a media company based in Hamburg, Germany. With more than 1,100 employees in its editorial offices, its documentation department, its publishing house and its subsidiaries, the company has been providing classification, orientation and enlightenment for over 70 years.

Over the past seven decades, the group has developed into a renowned multimedia media company with various subsidiaries and holdings. Its products are characterised by outstanding journalistic quality and independent reporting. The journalistic flagship – DER SPIEGEL – was founded in 1947 and stands for critical and investigative journalism. Today, the SPIEGEL brand reaches more than 14 million people every week across all channels.

Solution strategy based on Shareflex Invoice

During the selection process, the Hamburg-based Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft 365 specialist Portal Systems AG – together with its long-standing partner IBTG GmbH, which specialises in processing incoming invoices – was able to convince SPIEGEL with its Shareflex product and demonstrate a coherent solution strategy for the various challenges. From the very beginning, close cooperation was established with SPIEGEL’s IT department and SAP specialists.

A specialist service provider was selected to automatically read the invoice data – such as vendor details, header and footer data and invoice items. This service provider digitises the invoices, extracts the data and delivers it back to Der Spiegel on a daily basis, based on agreed SLAs. Afterwards, the data is automatically transferred to the newly developed SAP invoice cockpit.

User-friendly integration with existing financial accounting software

Accounting staff start the invoice verification process from the SAP Invoice Cockpit and always have an overview of the current processing status of the invoices in circulation. A tool provided by Portal Systems ensures reconciliation between the invoice cockpit and Shareflex Invoice / SharePoint Online.

The actual process of checking and releasing invoices then takes place in Shareflex Invoice. Additionally, by configuring Shareflex, the process can be flexibly adapted to meet business requirements. A processor and approver matrix provided and integrated into Shareflex ensures that the correct processor is always found. SAP-specific data is also used for invoice account assignment. Various escalation mechanisms ensure that the specified processing time is adhered to.

“We have been working with Microsoft 365 / Office 365 for years, and also exchange information directly with Microsoft about the latest developments. Thus, we have already been able to unlock a lot of potential for our group with the standard tools and functions. We are happy to add digital invoice verification to our application landscape on the Microsoft 365 platform. The product Shareflex from Portal Systems AG convinces us on a professional and technical level.”

Torsten SchorerDeputy Head of IT – SPIEGEL Group

More flexibility with Shareflex ECM Online

Portal Systems delivers pre-configured business applications based on Microsoft Office 365 that are highly flexible. Thus, it is easy to adapt them to individual customer needs.

Shareflex provides user-friendly interfaces, but also supports the backend for automating background processes. This is essential, for example, for complex permissions or the implementation of different workflow scenarios.

The Shareflex ECM Online product suite enables the fast and flexible digitalisation of business processes in the cloud and significantly reduces the effort and complexity compared to cloud-based individual development.

Results and Outlook

Today, a total of 15 clients are connected to the RESY system and around 20,000 incoming invoices are checked and approved by employees in the various companies of the SPIEGEL Group every year.

The SPIEGEL Group’s IT decision-makers also consider the project a complete success. With the combination of Microsoft Office 365 and Shareflex as a strategic cloud platform for business processes, a solution has been found that is fully in line with the IT strategy.

In the next step, the SPIEGEL Group is planning to extend the solution for incoming invoices with regard to the mapping of additional release guidelines. Furthermore, the possibility of digitising additional processes with the help of Shareflex is being examined, thus focusing even more on using SharePoint Online.