Simons Foundation

The Simons Foundation funds researchers taking on some of the world’s most complex challenges – however, when it comes to internal operations,the organization strives to keep expense and invoice processes, reduce manual touch points, and provide an excellent user experience for employees, guests and suppliers alike.

The Simons Foundation is a non-profit organization with a passion for giving, and a mission to actively support math, basic science and autism research. When this New York-based foundation first opened its doors in 1994, its entire team consisted of the two founders and one accounting employee. Today, with over 400 employees, and its own institute for the advancement of computational science, the foundation continues to fulfill its mission and make an impact every day.

Because it is a non-profit organization, its leadership is vigilant about keeping overhead low and efficiency high—streamlining operations and simplifying processes wherever possible. Although the organization had successfully transformed its travel and expense operation years earlier, until recently, its invoice process was still paper-based. The accounts payable team had to pick up the mail, scan it, code it, get approvals, print out checks, then, get them signed and mailed out. As a result, it took about three days to process and pay the 125 invoices the team received every week.

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