Cloud accounting has made things significantly more seamless and efficient for WeCorporate.
Finance and compliance experts, WeCorporate Global Consultancy helps local SMEs get a head start in cloud accounting with the right digital solutions
RECOGNISING a gap in the market, finance experts Adam Teh and Lim Pei Hau joined forces to create WeCorporate, a global consultancy which prides itself on its “small firm personality” with “big firm capabilities”.
“We began in 2018 in a little SoHo office in Petaling Jaya.“Both Adam and I wanted to help local SME business owners simplify and automate their finance operations. We also observed that with the e-commerce boom, many traditional businesses were increasingly keen to digitalise,” shared Hau, Director of WeCorporate.
The firm was launched as a one-stop-shop assisting clients with a full range of corporate advisory services from company set-up with accounting, payroll, tax and financial advisory, to regulatory and corporate migration matters. Focusing on start-ups, entrepreneurs and SMEs, the firm helps clients manage complex financial, compliance and accounting management processes, so that they can concentrate on growing their business.
Founders Lim and Teh both studied and worked in Big Four accounting firms in the United Kingdom before returning to Malaysia because they wanted to be closer to home. “Asia is the place to be,” Teh shared.
Teh noted that it was their work experience in the UK which inspired them to set up WeCorporate. “We saw first-hand how cloud accounting solutions and corporate services offerings could benefit both practices and their clients. When we returned to Malaysia, we realised that the many inefficiencies in how business admin work was performed, could be addressed with the help of digitalisation and automation.”
Founders Lim Pei Hau (second from right) and Adrian Teh (far right) are on a mission to help businesses take advantage of cloud accounting technology to improve their accounting processes.
The duo then embarked upon their mission to help businesses take advantage of cloud accounting technology to improve their business and accounting processes. Today, the firm serves about 800 SMEs and start-ups across Malaysia.
Making the right moves for growth
In 2020, WeCorporate merged with Singaporean company, InCorp Global to grow their footprint and help more businesses in Malaysia set up and expand across Asia.
The firm’s Malaysian SME clients could now leverage InCorp’s network to expand into Singapore without having to engage another firm, thereby accelerating the process. According to Lim, the merged firm’s strong cross-network of operations enables it to offer clients big firm capabilities to serve a broader clientele base, even as just a 30-strong team in their KL-based office.
Lim added: “We offer a one-stop solution for SMEs. This appeals to them because many SMEs find it both costly and time and labour intensive to engage multiple firms simultaneously to provide adjacent services. package our services together, from helping clients register their company, to setting up business accounts, and managing their accounting, streamlining all of that work and offering our clients greater efficiencies and visibility from the very start.”
WeCorporate considers itself fortunate to have begun their digital transformation in 2019 before the pandemic struck. “When the movement control order (MCO) hit, we suffered no downtime to our operations because everything was already running on the cloud,” Lim said. “We were able to work from home the next day. Digital tools like Xero and Zoom helped us stay connected and productive and we even managed to see some growth during the pandemic.”
Teh added that with business running in the cloud, they were able to maintain remote work operations with staff able to work from home, even when they ‘balik kampung’ to the outskirts of Kelantan or rural Sabah, while continuing to support their clients in Johor Bahru and Penang. “There’s an incredible amount of flexibility that cloud accounting provides, which is great for business continuity.”
Nonetheless, there have been some minor challenges too. Teh shared: “While there is a demand from clients to become more digital savvy, many of them are still set in traditional ways and use hard copies or paper documents. So there are a few issues when it comes to streamlining processes.
“On the bright side, however, our employees are relatively young professionals and quick to adapt to new software such as Xero. So even when handling these traditional clients, they can speed things up considerably and spend more time on analytical jobs rather than data entry.”
Starting with Xero
Before choosing an accounting software, Teh and Lim shopped around before selecting Xero. They knew they wanted to be cloud first and have everything done digitally, so Xero was “an obvious choice”.
“What we like about Xero is their human touch. When we started out, we had very few clients. But one of the Xero account managers wanted to pop by to say hello. We weren’t even in a proper office then and had to go downstairs to a coffee shop just to have a chat!”
That experience was something that stuck Lim because “we were not as sizable as we are now”, he says. “But Xero made it a point to attend to our needs. Every quarter, Xero’s account manager reaches out to understand how they can assist us in growing our practice. They go above and beyond by not only providing accounting advice, but also business advisory as well.”
Teh and Lim added that as their firm began to grow, Xero continued to support them at every juncture of their journey and through the Xero partner program, provided valuable resources and training to assist in their business growth over the next few years.
One aspect of Xero which Lim especially values, is the platform’s connection to over 1,000 apps on the Xero App Store which enables customers to create their own customised cloud solution to suit their industry and unique needs. “On the Xero App Store, we can search for apps that complement Xero. Our Xero account manager guides us by recommending the right integrated solutions for us and our clients,” he added.
Additionally, Xero’s multi-currency function has been particularly useful to our e-commerce clients who sell products in a global marketplace, such as Hiblendr Sdn Bhd, who retail portable and USB rechargeable juice blenders. “For businesses who transact in multiple currencies, live FX rate updates are incredibly important to their accounting. It helps business owners understand real-time currency exposure risks for fast, informed decision making. With the necessary financial data on the Xero platform, our team can also generate customised reports on demand for clients.”
Lim added that because everything is on the cloud, there is no business downtime. “We don’t ever have to worry about data or files going missing. Even with personnel changes, there is minimal handover required because the account’s access can be reassigned to another person who can pick it up from there. There is virtually no data loss.”
“Using Xero has also improved our team’s efficiency. Previously, we had to go through our bank statements one by one physically, but with Xero’s direct bank connections, bank transactions are automatically imported into the platform. This has saved us so much time and provides an up-to-date view of our cash flow every day,” shared Teh.
As a Xero partner, WeCorporate is listed on Xero’s advisor directory, which has helped in increasing their brand awareness. “Whenever prospective clients search for Xero, our name pops up too. This has helped us grow our brand visibility,” Teh added.
Speaking on their plans for the future, Lim says: “We aim to build our presence further in Malaysia and help more SMEs reap the benefits of cloud accounting. By adopting Xero, we can scale up faster because there are no limitations on our data storage or software capabilities.”
For more information about Xero, click here.
