Alliance Partners Validate Avalara's Position As Top Sales Tax Management Solution For Small And Mid-Sized Businesses

Avalara, the provider of Web-service based sales tax automation solutions for small and mid-sized businesses, recently announced that 30 enterprise resource planning (ERP), accounting and eCommerce software manufacturers and solution providers, including industry leaders such as Epicor Software Corporation, Sage Software and XONITEK Systems Corporation, have selected Avalara to deliver automated sales tax management services to their customers.

"Because sales tax management needs to be tightly integrated with a company's order processing software, Avalara has always had strong relationships and has been committed to working with the leading ERP, accounting and eCommerce software and service providers," said Ranjit Mulgaonkar, vice president of business development for Avalara. "Our announcement today demonstrates these providers have taken their commitment to delivering fully automated sales tax solutions to a new level, having strategically selected Avalara and our market leading sales tax management solution AvaTax to be an integrated piece of their product offerings."

Mulgaonkar added, "We are confident that the magnitude of vendors that have selected Avalara is greater than those that have selected any other sales tax management solution in the industry – illustrating a strategic partner ecosystem unprecedented in the market space, further solidifying our market leadership position."

Parallel with this announcement, Avalara launched its elite Avalara Alliance program for partners that have made a commitment to providing the most accurate and affordable solution for sales and use tax management services (STMS) to their SMB clients. The program complements Avalara's already industry-leading reseller partner program, which includes more than 500 ERP, accounting and eCommerce value added resellers, as well as its strategic technology partnership with ADP Taxware.

Exclusive to selected vendors wanting to establish a long-range commitment to co-development and co-marketing initiatives, the Avalara Alliance program is designed to promote collaboration between Avalara and other technology leaders to deliver innovative solutions that meet the complex sales tax needs of small and mid-sized businesses that are calculating, collecting, reporting and remitting sales tax in real-time in more than 12,500 taxing regions throughout North America. This commitment includes the ability to link to AvaTax to deliver a co-branded sales tax management solution, including the "Powered by AvaTax" brand.

Epicor was the first partner to OEM and embed AvaTax with its award-winning enterprise business software suites to deliver an on-demand sales tax management service to the midmarket and divisions of the Global 1000. "Avalara is the right partner for Epicor Tax Connect, powered by AvaTax, our full-service sales tax solution that customers can deploy on-demand," said Scott Hays, director of product marketing at Epicor. "With built-in integration provided by Epicor, the hybrid of Software as a Service (SaaS) and on-premise ERP makes perfect sense for our midmarket customers."

"Scalability, breadth of coverage and seamless integration into the Ignify e-commerce solution – were key factors in our selection of Avalara for sales tax management," stated Sandeep Walia, president of Ignify. "AvaTax ensures our SMB and mid-sized enterprise e-commerce customers remain compliant with tax regulations through real-time sales tax calculation and reporting regardless of the number of states or regions they operate in."

With the launch of the Avalara Alliance program, Avalara is pleased to disclose the involvement of 30 partners selected to deliver "Powered by AvaTax" solutions. These partners represent more than 200,000 businesses using one of 50 different ERP and eCommerce applications. Following are a few key Avalara Alliance partners:

• Epicor Software Corporation: Epicor Tax Connect, powered by AvaTax integrates with the Epicor Enterprise and Epicor CRS Retail suites. Future integrations are planned for Epicor Vantage and Vista.
• Sage Software: Sage Sales Tax, powered by AvaTax is currently available for Sage MAS 90, 200 and 500. An integration for Peachtree is also scheduled for later this year.
• XONITEK Systems Corporation: Integrates with XONITEK Macola Progression SQL Series
• Ignify: Integrates with Ignify eCommerce
• BizAutomation.com: Integrates with TotalBizAutomation
• BV Software: Integrates with BV Commerce
• Cyrious Software: Integrates with Cyrious Control 4.0
• Exigo Office: Integrates with Exigo Office

"We are confident the alliance between XONITEK and Avalara will be of tremendous benefit to both our existing and new customers. We realize that whether your business is a global, or small to midsize corporation, there has never been a more challenging time to effectively determine sales and use tax for the constantly growing number of taxing jurisdictions," said Robert Clark, director of consulting services at XONITEK. "With issues such as Sarbanes-Oxley compliance (SOX), the Streamlined Sales Tax initiative (SST), and impending state sales tax audits on the horizon, there are increasing additional layers of complexity to tax calculation and compliance. XONITEK recognizes these challenges and believes this alliance will enable businesses using the Macola Progression series ERP system to easily overcome these hurdles by producing accurate data as well as the ability to track it using a robust reporting tool to get the experience you'd expect from a sales tax management solution."

The Streamlined Sales Tax (SST) initiative is an effort by most states to reduce the administrative work and cost of compliance for businesses required to collect and remit sales tax. The effort includes uniform definitions for products, simplified exemption administration for exemption certificates, electronic filing and paying, and more options for retailers to use sales tax compliance software. Through the Avalara Alliance, these 30 companies are able to extend the benefits of Avalara's SST certification onto their clients. AvaTax is one of only three solutions certified by the Streamlined Sales Tax governing board to provide accurate and audit-protected sales tax management solutions.

In addition to the solutions represented within the Avalara Alliance, Avalara also has seamless integrations available for Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Dynamics AX, and Microsoft Dynamics NAV as well as QuickBooks and others. These integrations are sold exclusively through Avalara Infinity Resellers and are fully supported by Avalara.

"We are excited about building relationships that make sales tax calculation available to the often forgotten SMB market," said Scott McFarlane, president of Avalara. "Historically they have been dependant on sub-optimal tax research subscriptions or error-prone manual processes, making them a huge target for state audits. Businesses shouldn't be spending huge amounts of time and manpower on trying to be tax compliant; they should be focusing on growing their business. Much like with payroll, outsourcing sales tax management is cost effective."

About AvaTax
An SMB market-leading, Web-service-based sales tax solution, AvaTax instantly and accurately calculates sales tax for clients in any of the more than 12,500 tax regions in North America; provides detailed, real-time reporting; and automatically generates pre-populated sales tax returns. Currently, more than 10,000 licensed AvaTax users run an average of five to seven sales tax calculation transactions through Avalara's sales tax engine every second.

AvaTax comes integrated with SMB financial applications serving more businesses than any other solution on the market today, including Epicor Enterprise, Epicor CRS Retail Suite, Microsoft Dynamics GP, Microsoft Dynamics NAV, Microsoft Dynamics AX, Intuit's QuickBooks, Sage Software's Sage MAS 90 ERP, Sage MAS 200 ERP, Sage MAS 500 ERP, and Sage Accpac ERP. Additionally, with AvaTax On-Demand developers can integrate Avalara's sales tax Web service with any e-commerce, third party or custom-build solution with use of a comprehensive Software Developer's Kit (SDK).

About Avalara
Headquartered on Bainbridge Island near Seattle, Washington, Avalara is changing the sales and use tax landscape by delivering innovative and affordable solutions to small and medium businesses. Led by a team of industry experts in sales and use tax, and security and information technology, Avalara is focused on providing the easiest, most accurate and affordable way for businesses to address all their statutory sales and use tax requirements. Additional news and information are available at www.avalara.com.

SOURCE: Avalara