What Business and Tax Leaders Should Know About Edge Computing for Tax

According to a recent Forrester Consulting survey, 83% of IT decision-makers are interested in deploying a containerized edge tax solution. However, participants also share that many of their business and tax partners remain hesitant because they are not aware of the full range of benefits this type of solution delivers. When asked to specify why their organizations may not be ready for a containerized tax solution:

• 38% of IT decision-makers are not sure if their tax colleagues would be happy with it;
• 46% of say that it would be hard to convince colleagues to enhance current tax systems; and 
• 44% pointed to the high degree of internal red tape required to upgrade existing systems. 

Most IT groups have used edge computing and containerization across many application environments to streamline deployments, improve performance and scalability, reduce computational latency, ease maintenance and upgrades, and enhance control. These benefits are significant. So, if IT groups are to gain the benefits that a containerized edge tax solution offers, they’ll need to educate business and tax partners on the ways in which the solutions help them. 

For the business, benefits include:

• Flexibility: Edge computing technology lets organizations deploy their tax engine in multiple cloud environments and closer to where the transactions are occurring. As a result, if one cloud environment endures an outage, sees a spike in transactions, or must overcome latency issues, the application can continue operating in another cloud environment. 
• Better customer experience: Tying to flexibility, with a containerized edge solution for tax customers can make purchases any way that they choose, alleviating friction and creating a more seamless customer buying experience.
• Improved compliance: A containerized edge solution for tax provides better compliance controls from a data security and privacy perspective. Any and all data required to satisfy the growing body of data residency requirements remains secure and easily accessible.
• Scalability: Regardless of how an organization is growing or how transaction volumes are growing, a containerized edge solution for tax will offer consistent performance, leading to economies of scale.

For their part, tax leaders and their teams can gain:

• Improved accuracy: A containerized edge solution for tax enhances the accuracy and speed of tax calculations regardless of where a transaction takes place (in store, curbside pickup, delivery, etc.) or what type of device it occurs on (mobile, desktop, etc.). Tax professionals can rest assured that tax will be calculated accurately leaving them audit ready. 
• Greater control: A containerized edge tax solution provides organizations that are manually maintaining their applications and data with greater control by eliminating the cumbersome and resource heavy maintenance of a wide network of local endpoints.
• Increased value to the business: With improved speed and accuracy, Tax groups are now positioned as e-commerce and omnichannel enablers, which can help fortify tax’s credibility throughout the organization and better support business growth. 

While IT leaders should help their business and tax partners recognize the benefits of a containerized edge tax solution, they don’t need to go it alone. The Forrester Consulting research study, The Cutting Edge of Tax, commissioned by Vertex, provides plenty of data to help bolster their case.