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I don\u2019t want to be overly dramatic, but this wave of technology is as transformational as the Internet,\u201d says Aaron Harris, chief technology officer of accounting software company Sage.<\/p>\n
Harris is talking about the way artificial intelligence is changing productivity in small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). And Sage should know given its AI productivity assistant Sage Copilot<\/a> software has been developed from scratch. \u201cWe\u2019re not creating a world where bookkeepers and accountants and auditors are going to get replaced by technology,\u201d he says \u201cWe\u2019re creating a world where AI technology will support and enable them to do more valuable things and in a more rewarding way.\u201d<\/p>\n In other words, Sage Copilot is freeing small business owners to do less of the tactical work \u2013 sorting out the books \u2013 and more of the things they love, such as identifying new opportunities to grow their businesses. To Harris, AI is bringing an industrial revolution for industrious people.<\/p>\n There was a time when Sage was itself a small business. It began in 1981 as a three-person accountancy software enterprise in Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK. By the 1990s, it had been listed on the London Stock Exchange as a \u00a320m company. Now it is a global technology firm focused on using its 11,000 employees to serve small-to-medium sized businesses in more than 20 countries.<\/p>\n \n \u201c Those kinds of resources have been vital in building AI into its products, an endeavour that started nearly eight years ago. Sage\u2019s AI developers focused first on \u201ctask-based\u201d AI. \u201cThis is AI that does a specific thing like look for the total on an invoice, or spot a clerical error,\u201d Harris says. This is enormously useful to customers but it runs quietly behind the scenes rather than as a feature that customers would interact with. However, the recent emergence of more people-friendly \u201cgenerative\u201d AIs opened up an opportunity to take things to the next level.<\/p>\n Generative AIs produce outputs \u2013 words, pictures and data analyses for example \u2013 in response to users\u2019 \u201cprompts\u201d. These prompts are requests for information or a service. Chat GPT, for instance, will write an essay on any specified subject, redraw an image to turn friends into cartoon characters, or give a readable summary of medical information supplied by a GP.<\/p>\n High accuracy <\/p>\n Sage can\u2019t just use a general-purpose AI like ChatGPT, though. The ability of generative AI systems to hallucinate\u2013to make things up\u2014is well known. By contrast, Sage Copilot\u2019s output has to be utterly beyond doubt in every case. \u201cWe had to hit very high levels of accuracy, predictability and reliability,\u201d says Harris. \u201cGetting things 95 per cent right just doesn\u2019t cut it in our industry.\u201d<\/p>\n So Sage built and trained its own systems, what the company calls authentic intelligence, rather than embedding someone else\u2019s technology into its products. It improved accuracy using ringfenced training data that was finely tuned for the intricacies of accounting along with multiple layers of validation and cross-checking to ensure accurate results.<\/p>\n This process was enabled by Sage\u2019s AI infrastructure. For starters there\u2019s the \u201cSage AI Factory\u201d: a development environment that produces finely-tuned AI models trained on the expertise it has accumulated in accounting, payroll and compliance. The company also runs regular \u201chackathons\u201d where its developers innovate, stress-test systems and learn from each other. Sage publishes its data and AI principles to ensure systems offer full transparency, traceability and accountability. \u201cTransparency is key to trust,\u201d Harris says.<\/p>\n Fully compliant <\/p>\n With all this in place, the company launched Sage Copilot<\/a> in February 2024. It is now being used by a range of small and mid-sized businesses (see Box below). The technology does everything you\u2019d expect, including supporting real-time financial reporting and the auto-enrolment of employees in pension schemes. It chases unpaid invoices helping businesses stay in control of their cash flow and helping get paid up to seven days faster.<\/p>\n It fulfils compliance requirements too: Sage has long worked closely with HMRC, who fully support the move to incorporate AI into accounting. \u201cWhat\u2019s interesting is that they want us to do more,\u201d Harris says. \u201cThey want SMBs to have access to the technology we\u2019re building.\u201d<\/p>\n Sage Copilot\u2019s current incarnation is only the beginning. Agentic AI, autonomous, intelligent systems that need minimal human prompting, is imminent. Unlike simple assistants, Sage\u2019s AI Agents take full ownership of tasks, such as reconciling accounts, from start to finish and deliver the outcome back to the customer. Operating in the background, they spot risks and opportunities, ensure compliance, optimise productivity, and even pursue goals such as social responsibility or carbon-footprint reduction. Yet customers remain firmly in control, says Harris. Sage embeds trust and transparency into every layer of its AI, so agents can be trusted to complete jobs and act within the permissions each user sets.<\/p>\n But Sage isn\u2019t rushing this product to market \u2013 it\u2019s too important for that. \u201cWe have to maintain customer trust,\u201d Harris says. \u201cSo we\u2019re opening it up gradually and developing confidence with our users.\u201d<\/p>\n Harris couldn\u2019t be more excited about how the journey into the hi-tech future of accounting is playing out. \u201cWe started off by saying some very provocative things to our customers about what we were going to do with AI,\u201d he says. \u201cNow they are recognising that the big, bold, provocative future we described to them is becoming a reality.\u201d<\/p>\n And all, in a very accountant-like manner, with no drama.<\/p>\n Nadia Fontaine is the volunteer treasurer of the Auriol Kensington Rowing Club in Hammersmith, London. At any one time, she can have 100 invoices that need her attention \u2013 either to draft and send, or to chase. Sage Copilot now does all of that for her.<\/p>\n \u201cI save more than 5 hours of admin every week, making my life so much easier,\u201d Fontaine says. Copilot has improved the club\u2019s cashflow by chasing late payers and allows Nadia to spend more time keeping fit, fundraising and rowing on the Thames.<\/p>\n There\u2019s a similar success story to share at Tyne Chease in North Shields, a company that has pioneered the UK\u2019s first nut-based artisan cheese. Here, Sage Copilot\u2019s effect on the business\u2019s cashflow has been transformative. \u201cCopilot has really sped up how quickly we get paid,\u201d says Adam Williams, the firm\u2019s general manager. \u201cDepending on how busy we are, I sometimes wouldn\u2019t be chasing up overdue invoices, which were getting paid up to a week later than they needed to be,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n \u201dNow that Copilot prompts that and automates a lot of it, we get paid much quicker.\u201d<\/p>\n Find out more about Sage Copilot here<\/a><\/p>\n
\n We\u2019re creating a world where AI technology will support and enable accountants, auditors and bookkeepers
\n \u201c\n <\/p>\n<\/p>\n![\"Nadia](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/nadia-sage.png\")
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