Moving beyond traditional BPM
Most invoice automation projects today rely on Business Process Management (BPM) implementations. While powerful, these systems struggle with AI integration, high-volume transactions, and real-time processing.
To overcome these challenges, Profluo has built a new type of AI automation engine, laying the foundation for an Agentic AI-driven future for Finance teams.
At its core, Profluo’s platform is an event-driven finite state machine that interacts semantically with real-time invoice data. This enables AI agents to handle complex financial processes like:
- Record-to-Report
- Procure-to-Pay
- Order-to-Cash
Now, let’s explore the limitations of traditional automation and how Profluo is changing the game.
Scalability: Handling high-volume, high-velocity transactions
BPM systems often struggle with large volumes of invoices and lack real-time event-driven processing.
Profluo’s AI automation engine solves this by:
✔ Running entirely in-memory for ultra-fast processing
✔ Supporting workflows on tens of thousands of transactions with customizable triggers
✔ Seamlessly scaling in the cloud based on workload complexity
✔ Offloading cognitive tasks (like entity extraction, NLP, and AI predictions) to specialized infrastructure
This architecture ensures that even the most complex financial workflows run smoothly and efficiently.
AI-driven automation: Seamless decision-making
Most BPM platforms are not designed to integrate AI easily. AI capabilities, such as predictive analytics and decision-making, often require custom coding and extensive modifications.
With Profluo, AI is embedded natively into the automation engine:
✔ AI algorithms operate as Actions within workflows
✔ AI-generated insights function as Triggers for subsequent decisions
✔ AI-powered Conditions help dynamically monitor and optimize processes
This means finance teams can leverage AI effortlessly – without complex integrations or additional infrastructure.
Data quality & availability: Built for AI from day one
BPM platforms focus on tasks, not data, making it difficult to extract, validate, and normalize financial information without extensive custom coding.
Profluo takes a data-first approach:
✔ Trained on millions of real invoices and transactions, ensuring high data quality
✔ Designed to continuously learn and adapt to new formats and validation rules
✔ Allows AI-driven decision-making at every stage of the automation process
By making data the foundation, Profluo ensures that AI can function effectively and deliver accurate insights.
Cost & complexity: AI without the heavy lifting
Implementing AI in traditional BPM systems is often expensive and resource-intensive. Custom development, infrastructure, and continuous model training add significant costs.
Profluo dramatically reduces both implementation time and maintenance efforts.
Let’s dive into a short case study:
A large enterprise customer was struggling with a highly complex invoice approval system, involving hundreds of approvers, multiple custom conditions, and frequent change requests. Their existing workflow was:
- Cumbersome – Years of accumulated complexity led to inefficiencies
- Rigid – Changes required extensive manual intervention
- Frustrating – Users experienced delays due to unclear approval paths
To solve this, Profluo deployed over 120 customized approval workflows in just 3 days. The implementation included:
✔ Tailored triggers and conditions for real-time approvals
✔ Seamless integration into the customer’s existing financial systems
✔ AI-driven workflow optimization, ensuring smooth processing
Following deployment, the customer submitted daily change requests over a 2-week period, including:
- New approval steps
- Condition adjustments
- Approver role reassignments
- Department access right modifications
These updates were handled in real-time by just one support professional – a feat impossible with traditional BPM systems.
By removing the barriers of cost and complexity, Profluo makes AI-driven automation accessible to any Finance team.
Error handling & recovery: Total process transparency
High-volume finance operations require robust error recovery mechanisms. BPM systems often struggle with rollback capabilities, making corrections difficult.
Profluo introduces a more agile approach:
✔ Approvals can be reversed or re-analyzed without disrupting workflows
✔ AI agents track all changes for full audit transparency
✔ Approvers can modify decisions dynamically, adapting to real-time data
This flexibility ensures a more resilient, transparent, and efficient finance operation.
The future: Agentic AI in Finance
A new paradigm is emerging where AI agents actively assist Finance teams in decision-making, anomaly detection, and compliance.
Today, Profluo’s AI agents can:
✔ Evaluate massive amounts of invoice data and automatically determine the next processing steps
✔ Identify anomalies and trigger automatic corrections or escalate cases
✔ Validate invoices for commercial compliance
✔ Post detailed accounting and controlling entries directly into ERPs
✔ Generate customized financial reports automatically
Coming soon at Profluo: Even smarter AI capabilities
- Predict supplier behavior and propose accruals based on historical data
- Analyze unstructured contract data to identify commercial benefits (e.g., early payment discounts)
- Monitor customer risk in real-time, dynamically adjusting dunning activities and credit limits
The need for an AI-agentic finance future
Finance teams face ever-growing transaction volumes and pressure to cut costs. Profluo’s Agentic AI automation engine transforms invoice processing by:
- Eliminating inefficiencies
- Enhancing accuracy and compliance
- Empowering finance professionals with real-time AI insights
With Profluo, AI isn’t just an add-on – it’s the core of automation, elevating Finance teams to new levels of efficiency and intelligence. Book a free demo and start your new automation journey!
