Ep. 152: Nishant Nair - Modernizing Legacy Systems

Contact Nishant Nair:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ninair/


Forbes Technology Council:
https://profiles.forbes.com/members/tech/profile/Nishant-Nair-CEO-RecVue-Inc/329296c5-b50e-4cfc-a7dd-c6813580978d


Fintech Times article:
https://thefintechtimes.com/recvue-dont-let-outdated-systems-become-your-legacy/


Global FinTech Series interview:
https://www.recvue.com/blog/qa-with-recvues-ceo/?utm_content=172261129&utm_medium=social&utm_source=linkedin&hss_channel=lcp-6640106


FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPTAdam: (00:05)
 Welcome back to Count Me In, IMA's podcast about all things
affecting the accounting and finance world. This is your host,
Adam Larson, and you're now listening to episode 152 of our
series. The guest speaker for this series is Nishant Nair, CEO
and founder of RecVue, a modern order lifecycle management
solutions provider. In this episode, Nishant speaks with Mitch
about the value of new financial systems over traditional legacy
systems and the importance of streamlining your corporate
structure to enable further innovation. Nishant believes
businesses are walking when they should be running through
today's business landscape of adaptable digital technology. So
keep listening to hear more of what he has to say as we head to
the conversation now.
 
 Mitch: (00:54)
 Why is it important now more than ever for companies to
implement new financial systems within their businesses?
 
 Nishant: (01:01)
 Oh, that's a great question. Which, a simple way to explain
this would be with an example that we are all too familiar with.
Now, we don't go and get our movies from Blockbuster anymore. We
have Netflix, we have Amazon, we have Hulu. Essentially we are in
a digital economy and companies are changing the way they do
business. They're not selling products anymore. They're
converting the product into a service and selling services. So if
you look at the financial and audit systems that were essentially
designed for the Blockbuster world just does not meet the needs
of the Netflix business model. I mean, they're just not designed
for it. And it requires a completely new technology architecture
and thought process.
 
 Mitch: (01:53)
 Now with this new technology, these new thought processes,
obviously there are a lot of opportunities. So for those
businesses who are working on traditional legacy systems, what
are some of the main issues that they are really coming across
today?
 
 Nishant: (02:11)
 Sure, sure. So the main, the main challenge, right, that we
see with a traditional legacy system, it's its inflexibility,
inability to scale and the need for an army of IT resources and
business analysts to maintain it. Now compare that to modern
cloud-based server-less platforms that lets companies be agile,
right? Modern platforms built on cloud technologies make
businesses nimbler and more flexible to meet the customer's need.
I mean, if you look at, you know, these modern cloud platforms
take away the whole operational aspects of running and managing
huge software applications so that companies can now solely focus
on growing the business, introducing new revenue models and
making the customer successful, and then modern systems don't
require an army of people to maintain it as well. So a lot of
things that a, you know, a lot of challenges that we see with
traditional legacy systems that, that, that we don't, or that can
be avoided by transforming or with modern technology.
 
 Mitch: (03:31)
 Now you've mentioned some of the challenges that businesses
are facing. And again, the opportunities, the more streamlined
new approaches that are available for listeners in business who
are interested in taking action, right? What are some of the key
actions? these business leaders can take within their
organizations to accomplish a more streamlined, you know,
simplified corporate structure, where the army is not needed, as
you just said.
 
 Nishant: (04:01)
 So it all starts with aligning your finance, your it, and
revenue operations team towards a singular goal of transforming
the organization and, setting the course to innovate and win in
what we call a digital economy, right? And, that requires,
fostering a culture that is receptive to change. That's going to
be very important, right? To streamline operations. And even for
these digital transformation projects to be successful, finally,
it's the, it's the people that's going to make or break any
transformation, like this.
 
 Mitch: (04:48)
 And now you provided a great analogy, right? Going from
say, Blockbuster to Amazon and the trends that are happening all
across business. In general. I'm curious if you have recognized
and seen other trends, you know, are there other things happening
and obviously, particularly in finance financial services, what
are some of the trends that are really exciting you and things
that our listeners should be aware of? Maybe a little bit more
interested in.
 
 Nishant: (05:19)
 Yeah. From a, I mean, that is a lot of innovation. I mean,
a lot of innovation that is currently happening in the financial
services industry it's happening across, but specifically in the
financial services industry, there is a lot of innovation that's
happening that I'm really excited about. Right? I mean, if you
look at, you know, if you, if you go back 10, 15, 20 years gone
are the days when you had one or two large financial systems
doing a mediocre job of all the different business processes. Now
what I'm seeing is companies coming up using these modern cloud
technologies and focusing on one particular business process and
excelling it and being the best at it, right? I mean, if you look
at, Cooper is a good example for procure to pay. And if you look
at RecVue, which is for order to cash are prime examples of cloud
technology being used to essentially improve or optimize a
particular business process. And another area that I see is with
cloud technology and API based architecture, it actually allows
different systems to seamlessly talk to each other, and that's
driving a lot of adoption as well. I mean, people, especially the
next generation users are no longer compromising on any business
process. They want a system that is the best for that particular
business process. And today with the cloud technology and all the
different integration platforms that are available, it is
possible, right. And they want the best solution for each and
every business process. And that is resulting in a lot of
innovation in the financial services industry. It's a very
exciting times with both, you know, technology and the business
knowledge pretty much aligning with each other.
 
 Mitch: (07:25)
 And what happens if businesses essentially don't take your
advice, right? Everything we're talking about here, if a business
chooses to continue using its legacy, the antiquated processes
and systems, if they haven't gone digital, what are the risks?
You know, what would you predict will happen to these
businesses?
 
 Nishant: (07:46)
 The world is changing. The world is changing. We all
recognize that. I know the common example is obviously
Blockbuster to Netflix, but what I see is that same change
happening in each and every industry t...