The global travel and expense management software market size is expected to reach USD 17.4 billion by 2027, expanding at a CAGR of 12.4%, according to a study conducted by Grand View Research, Inc.

Travel and expense management software provides travel, expense, and invoice management services on a single platform, which helps organizations to approve and automate processes like submitting travel plans and expense reports.

Travel and expense management software has seen a rising adoption in the industries owing to the need for tracking and managing expenses.

Several companies are engaged in introducing the software on cloud platforms and providing its access to employees on their mobile phones. Mobile access has made it easier for employees to remotely update their travel expense data. In addition, the software can be integrated with functions like Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customer Relationship Management (CRM), and Human Capital Management (HCM) systems, which ensures streamlined data flow between these systems.

Travel and expense management software offers a simplified platform to the employees for generating expense reports and submitting the reports to the management for authorizing reimbursements. The software also helps in managing travel bookings and making itineraries for an employee, thus, providing an organized way to manage the data. Several vendors are integrating the software with mobile applications in order to ensure ease of access for users. This is also expected to assist users to access the software remotely while travelling. Therefore, availability of the software on smartphones and ease of access are some of the additional factors, which are expected to drive the market for travel and expense management software.

The travel and expense management software helps employers to eliminate the usage of paper and reduce manual and tedious tasks, which, in turn, helps in preventing errors. The management gets a profound view of all the expenses by integrating the travel and expense management software with Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Human Capital Management (HCM), and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems. The software thus provides the management with a consolidated view of all expenses made by employees, which helps them in managing budgets, and driving policy compliance. Additionally, this software helps in monitoring and analyzing a large amount of expense data on a single platform, thus saving time and money, which is further going to boost the market for travel and expense management software.

Travel and expense management software key suggestions from the report:

• Travel and expense management software is gaining traction owing to its availability on smartphones
• Small and medium enterprises held over 30.0% of the market share in 2019 and is anticipated to witness significant growth over the forecast period owing to the early return on investment and reduced administrative expenses
• The cloud segment is expected to capture a substantial portion of the market and is expected to witness a CAGR of more than 10.0% during the forecast period considering that it provides remote access
• Due to the increase in expenditure on business trips and higher accumulation of spending reports, the market is expected to witness significant growth over the forecast period.

The implementation of artificial intelligence in the software helps companies to automate and optimize the report approvals and payment processes for their employees. Artificial intelligence offers organizations with risk management solutions as the software analyzes travel histories and spending of an employee to fall in line with the policies.

The implementation of the travel and expense management software helps in streamlining travel bookings, automating the creation of expense reports, speeding up reimbursements, and simplifying financial reporting. Large organizations view the above factors as value addition, considering the large number of expense reports to be handled. Travel and expense management software helps organizations to analyze the expense reports through which the organizations will be able to form insights and make budgetary decisions. Owing to the increasing business travel and the need to generate accurate and efficient expense reports, the demand for software is expected to increase among small and medium enterprises.

Regional Insights

North America dominated the market with a share of 34.4% in 2019. This is attributable to the development and adoption of cloud technologies by enterprises. In Asia Pacific, the market for travel and expense management software is expected to witness rapid growth over the forecast period. The growth in the region is attributed to the presence of a large number of small and medium enterprises and their rising inclination towards travel and expense management software. Furthermore, the increased business travel in countries like China, India, and Hong Kong, among others, is also expected to add fuel to the demand for the software.

Furthermore, the demand for software across North America and Europe is attributed to the availability of software on mobile phones and the rising introduction of technological advancements. Similarly, demand for software in Latin America, the Middle East and Africa, and Asia Pacific is expected to rise owing to the development of the cloud infrastructure in these regions. Additionally, the presence of local companies like Zoho Corporation Pvt. Ltd.; Expensify Inc.; and VA Tech Ventures Pvt. Ltd., provides travel and expense management software for small and medium-scale enterprises in Asia Pacific, thereby resulting in market growth in this region. Meanwhile, the introduction of machine learning and predictive analytics is also expected to drive the market for travel and expense management software in North America.

Companies like Concur Technologies, Inc., Infor, Oracle, and Certify, Inc. are working on inducing artificial intelligence in the software, which will open up a wide array of features to the users. Companies have introduced solutions that support multiple currencies and languages and can detect and make automatic conversions using AI-based tools.

Machine learning is a technology that provides a system with the ability to automatically learn to predict and improve future outcomes. The integration of machine learning with the system will allow companies to keep track on employee expenses and will get real-time data in the form of an image of travel receipts from the employee. For instance, Concur Technologies, Inc. offers a feature that allows a user to take pictures of the receipt and digitally store it in the database. Additionally, the text from the receipt image can be extracted using Optical Character Recognition (OCR), and essential fields like date, currency, total amount, and spending type can be identified with the help of machine learning.

The software then creates an expense entry using the above field which can be added to spending reports. The system is embedded with chat-bots based on machine learning, which uses natural language processing to respond to a conversational request made by a user. Such technologies are expected to influence the company’s travel budgets in a positive way and are anticipated to drive the market.

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