Xero Cements New Strategic Partnerships to Provide Complete Picture of Front and Back Office for Small Business

DENVER, CO--(Marketwired - Jun 4, 2015) - Xero, Inc. (@Xero), the global leader in cloud accounting software for small businesses, announced strategic partnerships with industry leaders Bill.com, MINDBODY and Avalara to bring joint customers a complete picture of their front and back office in ways they have never seen before. Integrated solutions reduce time spent on administration and allow small businesses and their accounting partners to focus on growing successful businesses.

Bill.com, MINDBODY and Avalara join a growing list of over 400 of the most important small business applications integrated with Xero today, including industry leading companies like Expensify, Square, Vend and ZenPayroll. Together Xero and its partner community are raising the bar to better support small businesses.

Xero was created to provide a better experience for accounting software in the cloud -- simplifying back office functionality around the general ledger was just the beginning. Xero cloud accounting now offers more robust capabilities than traditional desktop solutions. Furthermore, Xero is extending its small business platform by connecting front-of-house applications to back office operations in seamless and integrated ways, leaving less room for human error, and offering more access to real-time data and increased efficiencies.

"From the very beginning we made Xero an open platform to let partners leverage the work we were doing to better serve the small business market," said Russ Fujioka, U.S. President, Xero. "Today's announcements show the power of our small business platform vision, the interoperability between applications, and what we can do together with our partners."

Fujioka added, "20 percent of all Xero customers work with one or more of our partners and in the premium editions of our product, that skyrockets to 40 percent. Partners are extremely important in helping us best serve our customers' needs."
The new partnerships were announced at Xerocon in Denver, Colorado, this week where over 500 customers and partners attended the two-day annual conference highlighting Xero's expansion and continued success in the U.S. market.

Bill.com and Xero - Real-time Snapshot of Financials
Xero and Bill.com are announcing a direct integration between applications to make it more convenient and secure for joint customers to have better control and insight into their complete financial situation. The joint solution will create a direct link between Xero and Bill.com to marry bill pay with online accounting, providing small business owners with a real-time snapshot of their financials.

The solution seamlessly syncs to provide paperless accounts payable, accounts receivable, and bill payment workflows. Users can create a paperless billing process, allow clients to receive bills electronically, and eliminate the need to print, sign or mail checks. The integration will also enable joint customers to save more time, eliminate double data entry, directly access payment support, and manage unpaid bills in Bill.com for approval and payment, which is automatically updated in Xero.

"Xero understands how important it is for small businesses and their accounting partners to stay on top of their accounts payable and receivable," said James Maiocco, GM Business and Corporate Development, Xero. "Bill.com is the leading digital business payments company creating simple solutions to speed time to payment. Together we are making life easier for our mutual customers who have other priorities demanding their attention."

"Manual back office processes have long plagued small business owners, making operations labor intensive, error-prone and costly," said René Lacerte, founder and CEO of Bill.com. "It's time they get the attention they deserve. Bill.com, along with Xero, is committed to making the 'doing' in business easier and more efficient by providing best-in-class AP/AR solutions that seamlessly integrate Bill.com and Xero."

MINDBODY and Xero Bring Front and Back Office Together
The health and wellness market is a rapidly growing industry for Xero, and MINDBODY is the leading global online wellness marketplace. Today, the companies are announcing an integrated solution bringing the power of the MINDBODY business management software together with Xero's cloud accounting software to help realize the vision of a seamless small business solution for mutual customers.

The Xero and MINDBODY integration allows health, wellness, and beauty professionals to save time and improve accuracy by transferring their sales data from MINDBODY into Xero without manual input. Daily transactions will automatically import and populate into the appropriate account within Xero's general ledger, providing business owners with real-time visibility into their cash flow.

The joint solution will increase efficiency for health and wellness business owners, saving significant time, eliminating manual entry, and avoiding potential human errors. MINDBODY and Xero together offer an end-to-end solution to help these business owners with tasks ranging from scheduling classes and managing clientele, to translating those activities into financial performance and reporting in one integrated solution.

"Yoga studios and other health & wellness businesses on MINDBODY, now have direct integration between their daily sales activity and their back office accounting," said Amy Vetter, Global VP of Education, and US Head of Accounting, Xero. "We are excited to provide this for MINDBODY customers so they can gain real-time insight into where their cash stands at any time, see how profitable they are, and have the ability to project out their financial health utilizing Xero."

"We're thrilled to partner with Xero to further streamline operations for wellness business owners around the world," said Brad Wills, Chief Strategy Officer at MINDBODY. "MINDBODY's robust business management software will now have the ability to automate financial processes and ultimately save time, allowing these business owners to focus more on delivering their services and fulfilling the needs of their customers."

Also announced today at Xerocon, a partnership with sales tax leader, Avalara, continuing to seamlessly integrate solutions for the small business platform. For more details on this partnership please see official press release here.

Availability
The Xero integrations with both Bill.com and MINDBODY will be available in August 2015.

About Xero
Xero is beautiful, easy-to-use online accounting software for small businesses and their advisors. The company has 500,000 subscribers in more than 180 countries. Xero seamlessly integrates with over 400 third-party tools, and was ranked No. 1 by Forbes as the World's Most Innovative Growth Company in 2014 and 2015.

About Xerocon
Xerocon 2015 is being held at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts on June 2-4, 2015 and will be attended by more than 500 accountants, bookkeepers, small business owners, financial professionals and 35+ exhibitors. Keynote speakers at the event include Xero CEO Rod Drury, Freakonomics author, Stephen J. Dubner and Polly Labarre, a founding member of Fast Company. Avalara is the lead sponsor of the event. Follow news from the conference on Twitter at @Xero and with #Xerocon.