Mr. Rajesh Gupta is the Co-founder & CTO of Busy Accounting Software– a company dedicated to providing business accounting software to Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises (MSMEs). An Electrical Engineering graduate from DTU (formerly Delhi College of Engineering), he is the technical mind behind India’s leading Business Accounting Software – BUSY. After completing his engineering, Mr. Gupta joined his elder brother (Mr. Dinesh Kumar Gupta) in his computers sales and maintenance business under the company name Digitronics. With the evolution of Information Technology, they realized that business automation will be the biggest challenge for SMEs in times to come. With their profound understanding of business processes, they conceived BUSY in 1993. The product was commercially launched in 1994.
Introduction
The idea of entrepreneurship and small business is fast growing in the rural areas of the Indian subcontinent. It is particularly because ownership and promotion of business in rural areas have proved to be mutually beneficial for the rural and urban population as well as the government and the country at large. However, the lack of access to urban and international markets due to limited development in such areas has always posed a problem for their businesses.
It is true that the technological advancements that rural areas have witnessed in recent times have been overwhelmingly helpful in improving the reach of businesses based in the areas, but a majority of the trade is run with limited resources and hence technology and its advancements are not affordable to everybody. The ongoing pandemic has also necessitated the need of introducing digital technology in commerce. With the world restricted to their houses, the only way to reach customers is through online platforms. Thus, technology has become the need of the hour for all enterprises.
Technology in rural areas
The past few years have seen rapid growth in terms of technology throughout the country. The rural areas have also been immensely affected by robust technical advancement. In recent times, the Government has been tirelessly working towards connecting the entire country, especially their rural counterparts, together digitally, and there has been considerable improvement. Internet, smartphones, and a lot of other modern technologies are no longer restricted to the urbanized regions of the country. This rise in connectivity and digitalization have directly contributed to increasing the growth potential of the rural business by introducing new markets to them and making everyday business tasks much more manageable.
Emergence and rise of E-invoicing
One of the technical boons that have made business tasks easier in today’s tough times is E-invoicing. In simple terms, E-invoicing is a digital invoicing process that helps eliminate human error. The concept has been a hit in recent times and has witnessed rapidly growing popularity in the work from home era.
E-Invoicing helps save time, money, and also mistakes by making the invoicing process easier. It also diminishes the possibility of fraud by mechanically authenticating all uploaded bills and is hence, a more reliable way of processing invoices. Another attractive benefit of this method is the greater control and insight that a person holds over the entire process, which becomes very complex in the traditional methods.
E-Invoicing and rural businesses
Some of the stark and constant limitations of the growth of rural businesses include the lack of access to greater customer base, lack of proper knowledge/ education, and lastly possibility of bill fraud. It is due to this fact that the E-invoicing methods are a blessing to rural businesses. It single-handily combats all the above problems while providing additional benefits of easier, faster, and safer invoice processing.
E-Invoicing also automates the entire invoicing process and thus eliminates the need for much human intervention. Since limited resources and time are a characteristic of small and medium businesses of rural areas, this model of invoicing is very attractive for them. That is because it saves on both times, as well as, expenses incurred on hiring human resources for this task. This is a very welcome benefit of the online invoicing system. With the extra time and money at hand, the business can now look forward to their other requirements that needed attention.
Increasing technology in rural areas and its impact on E- processing
Naturally, with the increase in not only the spread of technology but also its knowledge in rural areas, technical systems of work has become more popular and accessible. The rural people are becoming more and more trusting of the digital and technological framework with time.
As their acquaintance with the internet and the benefits it offers increase, it is bound to help make the foundation of online systems stronger in rural segments.
In a similar fashion, E-invoicing has been positively impacted by the rise in technology. The rural people are becoming increasingly reliant on technology due to its endless benefits. Especially in today’s times where remote and hybrid models of work are the new normal, this process helps rural businesses to enable their employees to take care of invoicing smoothly from anywhere across the globe.
The promotion of technology in rural areas also makes it much more affordable and accessible for those businesses that work with meager resources. Now even modest-sized organizations can move forward in their technical advancement through the use of systems like E-invoicing.
Summing up
Overall, the world has become very digitally aware and forward through choice over the last decade, and out of necessity in the last few years. The spectrum of modern-day enterprises is fast-changing, and the prudent thing to do is to keep up with the times and digitalize. The increase in the flow of technology and its accessibility has enabled Indian rural areas to sustain themselves in the fast-paced race of entrepreneurship.
Methods like E-invoicing have become more feasible, affordable, and approachable due to said advancements in the fields of digitalization and technology. From the way technology is picking up in the pandemic era, it is a possibility that online processing of all or at least a majority of business services will become the new normal in the future in both, the rural as well as the urban areas.