Latest research from Basware shows majority are investing in technology, but ROI remains elusive

CHARLOTTE, N.C., Feb. 10, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Calls from boards of directors and executive leadership to “do something with AI” are growing louder, and finance is struggling to answer them. According to a new report from Basware, a global leader in Invoice Lifecycle Management, nearly half of CFOs say they feel increased pressure from company leadership to implement AI across their operations. And while many are investing in agentic AI in response, a majority admit they are largely experimenting with the technology and flying blind when it comes to putting it into practice and delivering ROI.

As revealed in AI to ROI: Unlocking Value with AI Agents report, a global survey conducted by FT Longitude with support from Basware, six in ten (61%) of 200 finance leaders across the US, UK, France and Germany polled say their organization rolled out custom-developed AI agents largely as an experiment, simply to see what the technology could do. And one in four admit they still don’t fully understand what an AI agent looks like in practice.

It’s a vexing problem, and as they look to the year ahead, CFOs need to focus on solving it.

The Rise of Agentic AI

Two-thirds (66%) of respondents to the Basware survey say there is more hype around agentic AI than any previous technology shift, yet three-quarters are still figuring out the best way to leverage it. And the C-Suite is losing patience.

“We’ve reached a tipping point where boards and CEOs are done with AI experiments and expecting real results,” said Jason Kurtz, CEO, Basware.

And as the Basware research makes clear, agentic AI is the key to delivering them. While overall AI return on investment (ROI) rose from 35% to 67% in the last year, survey data shows agentic AI far – and companies using third-party solutions already embedded with AI agents – outperformed all categories with an average ROI of 80%.

Scoring Easy Wins

“Finance teams that focus on areas where AI can have immediate impact, such as automating accounts payable, improving compliance, reducing errors, and detecting fraud, can deliver these results,” Kurtz adds.

Respondents to the Basware survey confirm this, with 72% saying they see accounts payable (AP)—often the most manual and data-heavy part of the finance function—as the most obvious starting point for agentic AI. And it’s an area where Basware can deliver quick wins. At the end of the day, AP is a data problem. and Basware is solving it with AI. Over the last 40 years, the company has built the industry’s largest set of structured, high-quality AP data and processed more than two billion invoices. And it’s applying AI to this data to train its AI agents and deliver context-aware predictions, enabling finance teams to spend less time analyzing and more time deciding and acting. Other areas where they will likely deploy agentic AI:

• Automating invoice capture and data entry (30%)
• Cash flow management (24%)
• Scenario modeling and forecasting (23%)
• Lower operating costs (21%)
• Running real-time risk and market analysis (20%)
• Automating financial reporting and reconciliations (20%)
• Streamlining compliance checks and regulatory filings (19%)
• Detecting duplicate invoices or potential fraud (19%)
• Reducing overpayments or duplicate payments (18%)

Build Vs Buy

Organizations that leverage intelligent platforms like Basware’s Invoice Lifecycle Management that are embedded with agentic AI and uniquely designed to drive these processes can deliver the results they’re leadership is expecting with greater speed and cost efficiency than cobbling together point solutions or attempting to build their own.

Take InvoiceAI, a solution delivered on the platform that intelligently and securely applies generative and agentic AI, natural language processing and deep learning across the entire invoice lifecycle. Leveraging embedded AI Agents, the solution goes beyond simple automation to autonomously processes invoices and deliver game-changing improvements in speed, accuracy and compliance.

From Hype to Reality – and ROI

But achieving these results requires clear strategies and governance to drive them.

According to the Basware survey, nearly three quarters (71%) of finance teams seeing the weakest returns from AI reported acting under pressure and without direction, compared to 13% of teams achieving strong ROI.

“Our research confirms what we see every day: AI for AI’s sake is a waste,” Kurtz said. “Agentic AI can deliver transformational results, but only when it is deployed with purpose and discipline. And that means embedding AI directly into finance workflows, grounding agents in trusted data, and governing them like digital employees. This is how AI moves from innovation to impact. And this is what Basware delivers for our customers.”

To learn more about Basware’s Invoice Lifecycle Management platform and the value it is delivering to enterprises around the globe, click here.

About Basware 

Basware is how the world’s best finance teams gain complete control of every invoice, every time. Our Intelligent Invoice Lifecycle Management Platform ensures end-to-end efficiency, compliance and control for all invoice transactions. Powered by the world’s most sophisticated invoice-centric AI – trained on over 2 billion invoices – Basware’s Intelligent Automation drives real ROI by transforming finance operations. We serve 6,500+ customers globally and are trusted by industry leaders including DHL, Heineken and Sony. Fueled by 40 years of specialized expertise with $10+ trillion in total spend handled, we are pioneering the next era of finance. With Basware, now it all just happens. 

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SOURCE Basware

RedChip Companies, Inc. (Media Suite)

ORLANDO, FL / ACCESS Newswire / February 9, 2026 / RedChip Companies, an industry leader in investor relations, media, and research for microcap and small-cap companies, today announced that on-demand replays from its Fintech & Digital Asset Treasury Strategy (DATS) Virtual Investor Conference, held February 4, 2026, are now available.

The conference showcased senior executives from publicly traded companies operating at the intersection of modern payments, financial technology infrastructure, and digital asset treasury strategies. Investors who were unable to attend the live event-or who wish to revisit specific company presentations-can now access full video replays at their convenience.

“The strong engagement we saw throughout this conference highlights the accelerating investor interest in fintech innovation and digital asset treasury strategies,” said Dave Gentry, CEO of RedChip Companies. “By making these presentations available on demand, we are extending access to critical insights into how public companies are navigating evolving payment systems, digital assets, and balance sheet strategies.”

Conference Presentation Replays

Investors may view individual company presentations and Q&A sessions using the links below:

Additional presentation replays are available on RedChip’s YouTube channel.

Each replay includes a management presentation followed by a live investor Q&A session, providing deeper insight into business models, growth strategies, regulatory considerations, and key milestones related to fintech platforms and digital asset treasury initiatives.

The Fintech & DATS Virtual Investor Conference was designed to give institutional and retail investors direct access to companies driving innovation in payments, financial infrastructure, and digital asset management as adoption continues to expand across enterprises and institutions.

About RedChip Companies

RedChip Companies, an Inc. 5000 company, is an international investor relations, media, and research firm focused on microcap and small-cap companies. Founded in 1992 as a small-cap research firm, RedChip gained early recognition for initiating coverage on emerging blue chip companies such as Apple, Starbucks, Daktronics, Winnebago, and Nike. Over the past 33 years, RedChip has evolved into a full-service investor relations and media firm, delivering concrete, measurable results for its clients, which have included U.S. Steel, Perfumania, Cidara Therapeutics, and Celsius Holdings, among others. Our newsletter, Small Stocks, Big Money™, is delivered online weekly to 60,000 investors. RedChip has developed the most comprehensive service platform in the industry for microcap and small-cap companies. These services include the following: a worldwide distribution network for its stock research; retail and institutional roadshows in major U.S. cities; outbound marketing to stock brokers, RIAs, institutions, and family offices; a digital media investor relations platform that has generated millions of unique investor views; investor webinars and group calls; a television show, Small Stocks, Big Money™, which airs weekly on Bloomberg US; TV commercials in local and national markets; corporate and product videos; website design; and traditional investor relation services, which include press release writing, development of investor presentations, quarterly conference call script writing, strategic consulting, capital raising, and more. RedChip also offers RedChat™, a proprietary AI-powered chatbot that analyzes SEC filings and corporate disclosures for all Nasdaq and NYSE-listed companies, giving investors instant, on-demand insights.

To learn more about RedChip’s products and services, please visit:

“Discovering Tomorrow’s Blue Chips Today”™

Follow RedChip on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/redchip/

Follow RedChip on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RedChipCompanies

Follow RedChip on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/redchipcompanies/

Follow RedChip on Twitter: https://twitter.com/RedChip

Follow RedChip on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@redchip

Follow RedChip on Rumble: https://rumble.com/c/c-3068340

Subscribe to our Mailing List: https://www.redchip.com/newsletter/latest

Contact:

Dave Gentry
RedChip Companies Inc.
1-800-REDCHIP (733-2447)
1-407-644-4256
info@redchip.com

–END–

SOURCE: RedChip Companies, Inc.

View the original press release on ACCESS Newswire

When you’re running a business of whatever size, it’s critical to know your numbers – but when you’re running the finances for 22 schools, it’s even more imperative to get your maths right.

Established in 2016, Sapientia Education Trust (SET) is responsible for more than 8,500 pupils and 1,300 staff across Norfolk and Suffolk. However, until 2022, the administration of its finances was still being done the old school way – manually – with piles of paper-based files and spreadsheets.

Steven Dewing, SET’s chief financial officer, says: “When I joined in September 2021, the team were struggling. The trust was recovering after Covid, and getting invoices paid on time and reports delivered on time was a challenge.”

The system being used by the trust was adopted back when it encompassed just five schools. By the time Dewing joined, the number of schools had risen to 15 – each with its own database and no sharing of data. “There were lots of silos.”

Dewing recalls how his deputy needed a whole day each month simply to reconcile it all, with numbers pulled out and manually put on to consolidated spreadsheets. Only then could data be manipulated into the right formats needed.

“That was not uncommon for finance departments,” he says, “but it is very prone to error. Also, invoices were being manually signed, requisitions were written by hand, and because we had a different system for each school, we couldn’t join these up. People physically carried around loads of paper, so it was hard to maintain compliance.”

‘Everything in one database’

All this changed in September 2022 when SET moved to a new system, Sage Intacct, which was rolled out with the support of ION, a Sage Education implementation partner.

And for a trust that includes the country’s largest state boarding school with 1,400 children alongside small, rural primary schools with as few as 16 pupils, the finance platform was a gamechanger.

“Now we have everything in one database,” says Dewing. “Each school is still its own entity, but it’s all shared so there is no manual reconciling, it all just happens in the system.”

He adds that using Intacct has also meant SET can combine purchasing across the trust, allowing it to benefit from economies of scale and supplier discounts, while reducing the admin of having to purchase across all its schools.

He also highlights the platform’s ease of use and describes how having access to personalised dashboards for every user has been a massive step forward. “We used to pull out data and then email it to people,” he says, “but now depending on what level you are and what your role is, there are different dashboards. Users can go in and see information whenever they want and drill down to the transaction. It has enabled us to empower them with data they need, when they need it.”

Successful use cases for this part of the implementation include head teachers in SET’s small rural schools seeing an accurate and real-time position of their finances, with staff able to login from any location any time to study the data and reports.

“What’s good is we can pull in non-financial information too, like pupil numbers and staff numbers,” adds Dewing. “You can then combine that with other data to give cost per student, cost per staff member, and much more, without any Excel manipulation.”

Adding up the time saved with AI

Within SET’s finance department, a pool of four people is responsible for multiple schools reporting to Dewing. Below this there are others who input transactions, invoices and payments.

To ensure the department was up to speed from day one, ION provided training in Sage Intacct during the onboarding process. It offered Dewing and his colleagues a structured programme, which the CFO says was a major help given “it’s a really big bit of software with lots of different functionality”.

“Having someone guide you through it and teach you what it does, while making sure you’re doing the right things at the right time, was vital,” he says. “We broke the training down into four two-hour sessions rather than one whole day and also got them to record some short videos, which we continue to use.”

Dewing has found a number of Sage Intacct’s AI-driven tools particularly useful. For instance, Outlier Detection, which automatically spots data appearing in odd patterns and suggests corrections, and Accounts Payable Automation, which uses AI to populate invoices against purchase orders.

Given that SET processes more than 25,000 invoices a year, this represents a transformational timesaver for colleagues who no longer have to input the details themselves and simply now check over the AI-prepared documents.

Dewing cites this as just one key example of how the move to Sage Intacct has revolutionised what his finance team can do for the wider trust.

“It has enabled finance to move from a pure admin function, where you carry bits of paper around and get things paid, to a strategic partner in the organisation,” he says. It’s become less about ‘have we paid this on time or have we ordered that’, because that just happens through the system.

“We can now spend far more time supporting people to take financial decisions and in budgeting. Sage Intacct has changed our relationships with the schools because they see what value we bring.”

Find out more about Sage Intacct and book a demo, at: sage.com