Every now and day new reports appear on e-invoicing maturity. (con)temporary residents of the e-invoicing arena, are familiar with the Billentis report. Which is distributed freely. Another provider of leading reports is Gartner. And it recently issued IT Market Clock for B2B Solutions, 2014.

Tradeshift invested in buying the report and was kind enough to publish the summary IT Market Clock image in a blogpost. It is a nifty and yet complex image. Underneath is short explanation of the elements in the image:

1. QUARTERS: The image represents a clock that is divided into quarters, starting with “Advantage” (markets that have moved from emerging to adolescence), and they continue clockwise to “Choice,” “Cost,” and “Replacement” as innovations mature.
2. AXIS: The clock also has two axis. The X-axis moves between “dusk of obsolescence” and “dawn of standards”. The Y-axis moves, moves between “market start” and “zenith of industrialisation”.
3. COLOR CODING: The dots in the market clock have different colours. They indicate how long it will take the switch to the next market phase, or “quarter” if you like.
4. POSITION TOWARDS THE CENTER: The further away the asset class is from the centre, the closer it is to commoditisation (when goods or services become a commodity).
5. INNOVATIONS: Those are the dots like e-invoicing, supplier portals, managed file transfers and procurement networks

How Gartner looks at electronic invoicing

Based on the position of e-invoicing in its Market Clock 2014, Gartner says this about investing in electronic invoicing:

• “Start evaluating e-invoicing project opportunities now, regardless of your company’s vertical industry or financial shape. The pressure to do some form of e-invoicing will increase, no matter where you are, or the size of your business. Sooner or later, you will face the hard deadline of a government mandate.”
• “Choose a solution that addresses internal and multi-enterprise business processes, IT infrastructures, laws and security, and that it’s certified by tax auditors for as many countries as possible.”
  

So, according to Gartner the time is now to invest in e-invoicing. It is beyond the dawn of standardisation and it will take another 5 to 10 years before e-invoicing switches to the next phase, where it will be integrated into more encompassing services (like those of integrated commerce hubs).