Construction Industry Platform Briq Buys Swipez to Add AR Automation

Construction industry-focused financial automation platform Briq has expanded its capabilities by acquiring India-based FinTech Swipez.

Swipez automates billing and accounts receivable (AR), and its tools will be added to Briq’s existing ability to automate planning, payment and other financial workflows for construction companies, according to a Thursday (Sept. 8) press release.

“An ongoing challenge is the lack of certainty around cash flow in the construction industry, and we attribute that to a broken payment process,” Briq Co-Founder and CEO Bassem Hamdy said in the release. “Bringing automation to the billing and accounts receivable functions will drastically improve the ability for construction companies to accurately project cash flow.”

Aiming to help construction companies grow by using FinTech, Briq automates corporate planning and the forecasting of labor, materials, projects and revenue. The platform also offers construction companies the ability to automate accounts payable (AP) allocation, credit card reconciliation and payments, per the release.

“We are thrilled to join Briq and combine our expertise in automation to bring more clarity and efficiency to the financial processes in construction,” Swipez Co-Founder Vivek Iyer said in the release.

Digitization and AR automation could go a long way toward helping construction companies maximize their efficiency and lower their costs, according to the “Working Capital Playbook,” a PYMNTS and YayPay collaboration.

Currently, without automation, the construction industry loses $100 billion annually due to delays that stem from the aging infrastructure used to transfer payments and companies’ slowness in documenting, approving and communicating payments. As a result, almost half of all construction firms wait up to 90 days to receive payments, according to the report.

AR automation, which has seen widespread implementation elsewhere in the business world, is working to close this payments gap.

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