Towards a Shared Prosperity with Intuit’s Open API

#Intuit sensed the gravitation towards an #App economy early on as we launched our #Open #Platform strategy unlocking the Intuit #API for the developers to access and integrate the apps they build with #QuickBooks. Today with a bevy of new tools and experiences we are empowering these developers to not only script their own successes but also power prosperity for the small businesses and accountants we solve for.

#IntuitCircles #PoweringProsperity #API #Developers #QuickBooksOnline #Intuit

Since the onset of 2019, the industry has been ringing with the concerted chime of experts about the unprecedented growth of the App economy. Technologies like AI and ML are empowering app developers to create tailor-made user experiences heightening engagement with customers to a level never seen before. 2019 is expected to witness the ultra-growth phase of apps with users estimated to spend $120 billion by the year-end.     

With its natural appetite for spotting industry shifts, Intuit could sense this gravitation towards an App economy as early as 2013. That’s when we announced our open platform strategy allowing developers to access our Application Program Interface (API) and integrate the apps they build with QuickBooks. Today with a bevy of new tools, Intuit is well poised to leverage the app upsurge by empowering developers to grow into full-scale fintech companies, sustain their success and ultimately create a multiplier effect by powering prosperity for the small businesses and accountants we solve for.

Developer to a fintech company

It is the shared passion to re-imagine the traditional ways of doing things that gets us – the third party app developers and Intuit - together. That was the case when Kelly Cherniwchan founded chata.ai. His quest for an easy access to data led Cherniwchan to launch a “conversational business tool” that uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to recognize users’ questions to locate data. Chata.ai integrates with QuickBooks Online in seconds allowing users to get instant answers to questions about expenses, top customers among others. Buoyed by its success of using QuickBooks online API, chata.ai is now gunning to become the “hub” for all business data interactions.

Chata.ai demonstrates how developers are leveraging, Intuit’s API to grow into full-scale fintech companies. From offering a free publishing platform apps.com to a ready marketplace that directly connects developers to the QuickBooks users, Intuit Platform is emerging into a thriving marketplace hosting umpteen number of third-party apps.

Towards a sustainable business

Turning ideas into sustainable businesses is one of the most formidable challenges a developer faces. Our re-imagined suite of offerings strive to outflank the ‘idea to reality’ hurdle by making the launch, marketing and discoverability of apps to the target audience seamless.

The scale at which start-ups like the India based Fyle, a user of Intuit’s API, is growing speaks volumes of the effectiveness of our partnership with developers. One of the world’s fastest-growing expense management solutions, Fyle, a member of Intuit Circles, had a dream of going global. Today catering to180 customers globally, Fyle has expanded to the US, Netherlands, and Singapore.

Evolving into success multipliers

Overall, this array of apps available on the Intuit platform are driving three profound shifts which engulf all important actors in our ecosystem – the small businesses, the accountants and Intuit itself:

• Intuit transforming into a self-sufficient ecosystem solving all things financial for our customers: Additions such as project costing capabilities by TSheets, or QuickBooks Payroll that helps 1.4 million Intuit customers save an average of $600 annually, Intuit is inching towards being a self-sufficient ecosystem where the “jobs,” under-served by our products, is being solved by the apps we recruit.
• Accountants evolving as one stop financial consultants: New Apps in the Accountant Apps Program are empowering accountants to go beyond just managing customers’ taxes and accounting. They are now connecting customers to the right apps that allow easy adding and managing of bills.
• Customers are transforming their businesses: The ecosystem of Intuit's suite of tools - that comprise QuickBooks, which includes Payroll, Payments, Capital, Time-Tracking among others – are helping entrepreneurs to automate and simplify how they manage their finances freeing them up to focus on what matters most--their business.

Clearly, the ecosystem success story we are scripting signals that the era of isolated profit-making is giving way to a new phase of shared prosperity around the world.