How this tech unicorn plans to save companies $4bn a year

Enable - backed by Australia’s Titanium Ventures - has taken over a New Zealand company as the rebate software firm expands into the Asia Pacific market.

Enable says its software can save business about $400,000 to $500,000 a year 'straight away'.

Tech unicorn Enable is deepening its expansion into the Asia Pacific market, with the rebate software company acquiring New Zealand Flintfox what it says is “the world’s fastest pricing engine” to help companies save $4bn globally a year.

Enable - backed by Titanium Ventures and based in San Francisco - says it can deliver an average return on investment of 400 per cent within the first year of signing up to its rebate management platform, underscoring the extent of how much sloppy record keeping is costing businesses.

Enable founder and chief executive Andrew Butt.

Globally more than $1 trillion in rebates are issued each year but about 4 per cent of that amount goes unclaimed, with leakages from companies using antiquated software or spreadsheets.

Co-founder and chief executive Andrew Butt said if a company is getting $10m a year in rebates, it could save $400,000 or $500,000 a year “straight away” with Enable.

Mr Butt said with Flintfox - which Enable has acquired for an undisclosed sum - it would be able to increase return on investment further by combining rebates and pricing.

“If you can imagine all of these companies in the supply chain, you know that they are receiving these rebates, and many of them also pay rebates to their downstream customers,” Mr Butt said.

“But they also, of course, are constantly thinking about what their cost price is, what their sell price is. And if you want to look at the overall margin - the end to end kind of profitability, you can’t just look at rebates. You have to look at pricing as well.

“That is a really, really significant part of this.

“When I first started this company, it was extremely siloed out there in the market where companies would have a rebate team, and all they did was they just negotiated rebates with suppliers and then they get bonus, you know? ‘Oh, great, well done. You got a 5 per cent rebate. We’ll pay you a bonus’.

“But actually, in many cases, they were losing money as a company because then the pricing wasn’t very good. So now that’s all coming together.”

Mr Butt said uniting rebate and pricing management and execution capabilities, the combined platform enabled organizations to “drive better collaboration, align incentives with strategic goals, and maximize profitability”.

New Zealand will now become Enable’s fifth major global hub. Flintfox employs about 90 people and the acquisition will lift the total number of Enabled employees to 120 across its three offices in Australia and New Zealand.

John Moss, Flintfox chief executive said: “Enable and Flintfox share a vision of helping businesses achieve smarter, more profitable trading strategies”.

Enabled raised $US120m ($194.9m) in late 2023, giving it a pre-money valuation of $US1bn.

Originally published as How this tech unicorn plans to save companies $4bn a year