Speaker: Robert Barnes, CEO, Marco Polo Network
What does your company do and what is your role there?
Robert Barnes: Hi, I'm Rob Barnes and I'm the CEO and Co-Founder of Marco Polo Network. Our smart matching and B2B payment solution called Supplier Pay brings together every element of the accounts payable invoice automation process under one roof for large global corporates and their vast network of suppliers globally. By reconciling the buyer's accounts payable and the suppliers accounts receivable processes side by side, you drive efficiencies and cost savings for everybody involved. Invoice matching is reduced from an average of 20 days down to seconds. Discrepancies are flagged and can be dealt with immediately online by both parties with full transparency. Maturing payments are automatically scheduled and reconciled back to the ERP ERP or accounting system, and suppliers can even choose to get paid early.
Why did you choose Google Cloud?
Robert Barnes: We chose Google Cloud for two reasons. The first being technology fit and the second global reach. On the technology side, Marco Polo has a unique architecture. Not only is it fully cloud based, it is also fully decentralized, meaning a single buyer and their network of suppliers can result in tens of thousands of individually deployed platforms on the cloud. This architecture is well suited to Google Cloud platform in terms of scalability, efficiency and security. On the reach side, many of our current and future customers use Google Cloud, so we wanted to support the growth of their existing GCP relationships by deploying their supply chain ecosystems on GCP as well. In turn, Google can offer their customers an industry-first purchase-to-pay solution deployed on blockchain and GCP to automate and streamline and reconcile accounts payable and accounts receivable together with their supply chain.
What have you achieved using Google Cloud solutions?
Robert Barnes: We have successfully deployed our blockchain enabled decentralized network on Google Cloud Platform, and we're working closely together to expand the network of customers and their supply chains.
What are your future plans for working with Google Cloud?
Robert Barnes: Working with Google Cloud allows us to best serve our customers and their supply chains, both domestically and globally, as we scale our network. This allows our joint customers to make their supply chains more resilient, inclusive, lower overall costs and expand access to financing. The numbers are quite large, each individual supply chain consists of thousands, if not tens of thousands of suppliers. And within a short period of time, we expect to quickly expand the network to millions of businesses, including many smaller firms in need of cash flow certainty, payment transparency and the option to get early payments to increase working capital.
