THE CLIENT
Messe München India
Messe München India Pvt. Ltd. (MMI) is the Indian subsidiary of Messe München GmbH, one of the world’s leading trade fair companies headquartered in Munich, Germany. MMI organizes large-scale trade fairs and exhibitions across India, bringing together companies from diverse industries and geographies.
The company operates with a wide network of vendors and service providers across multiple cities, from venue setup and logistics to AV, printing, catering, and event support. Managing this vendor ecosystem at scale, while maintaining tight financial controls and compliance with the parent company’s processes, is central to how MMI operates.
MMI was already using SAP for core business accounting, Zoho Books, and Zoho Expense as part of their existing tech stack, with custom SAP APIs already built for Zoho Expense integration.
What Was Broken
MMI’s Accounts Payable process was straining under the weight of its vendor operations. The company works with service providers spread across multiple cities. Onboarding new vendors, raising purchase orders, processing proforma invoices, matching vendor invoices to POs, and releasing payments all required manual intervention at every step. There was no structured approval workflow, no vendor self-service, and no automated link between Zoho and SAP for AP transactions.
The result: slow vendor onboarding, delayed purchase orders, payment approvals stuck in email chains, invoice mismatches caught too late, and finance spending hours on reconciliation that could have been automated.
What BGA Delivered
BGA designed and implemented a comprehensive AP and Vendor Management workflow system on Zoho Books, customized to MMI’s specific approval structures and integrated bidirectionally with SAP via API. The system covers the full vendor lifecycle, from onboarding to payment, with structured approvals at every stage.
- Vendor Onboarding Portal
We built a self-service vendor registration process. MMI initiates onboarding by sending a registration link to the vendor. The vendor fills in their company details, uploads compliance documents, and submits for review. An internal approval workflow validates the submission, and once approved, the vendor is created in the system and pushed to SAP automatically.
- Purchase Order Workflow
Purchase orders are now created inside Zoho Books with a structured approval workflow. POs can be linked to sales orders or raised independently, with fields for work order references and supporting documentation. Approved POs are automatically synced to SAP, eliminating double entry and ensuring both systems stay aligned.
- Invoice Processing and Matching
Vendor invoices are entered against POs with supporting document uploads. The system supports AI-powered auto-scan to pre-fill invoice details, reducing manual data entry. A 2-way/3-way matching process validates invoices against POs and receipts before triggering the approval workflow. Once approved, payments are auto-created in Zoho Books.
- Proforma Invoice and Advance Payments
For vendors who require advance payments, proforma invoices are captured against the PO with an approval workflow. On approval, the system auto-creates a vendor advance payment entry in Zoho Books. All proforma invoices linked to a PO are visible in a consolidated view.
- Vendor Credit Notes
Credit notes are processed with document uploads and an approval workflow. Once approved, payables are automatically adjusted in Zoho Books, keeping the vendor ledger accurate without manual intervention.
- Vendor Self-Service
Vendors can now view their approved purchase orders, submit proforma invoices and final invoices, and track the status of their submissions. This reduces back-and-forth communication and gives vendors transparency into the payment cycle.
- SAP Integration (Bidirectional API)
The system maintains a cross-reference master for GL accounts, tax codes, cost centres, and project codes between Zoho and SAP. Approved vendors, POs, invoices, credit notes, and payment information are synced to SAP at regular intervals via API. This ensures SAP remains the single source of truth for accounting while Zoho handles the workflow and approvals layer.
- Role-Based Approval Matrix
User roles were configured with specific approval authorities for each transaction type. Every PO, invoice, proforma invoice, credit note, and payment goes through a structured multi-level approval flow based on the user’s role and transaction value.
BGA Approach
This was not a typical Zoho implementation. MMI already had SAP running their core accounting. They did not want to replace SAP. They wanted a workflow and approvals layer that sits on top, handles the operational complexity of vendor management and AP processing, and keeps SAP updated automatically.
BGA brought the right combination: Deep understanding of AP processes, Zoho platform expertise, and the ability to design API integrations between Zoho and SAP. We understood that in an MNC structure, every transaction needs an approval trail, every vendor onboarding needs compliance documentation, and every data point that goes into SAP needs to be validated first.
The result: a Zoho-based AP workflow system that gives the operations team speed, gives the finance team control, gives vendors transparency, and keeps SAP as the single source of truth for accounting.
