AI ambition with real-world guardrails.
Recognizing AI as a lever for competitive advantage, JBI Interiors’ leadership team, encouraged in part by conversations across the investor community, committed to a deliberate modernization roadmap. CFO David Calvert and his peers still had practical questions about security, operating model fit, and how quickly finance could trust a new system of work.
“As CFO, I needed transparency into every AP decision. Kognitos gives me that, every approval, every exception, documented in plain English.”
- Tailored assurances and a responsive, consultative rollout style
- Clear answers to security, control, and architecture questions from day one
- A fast path to value so finance could “leap” into governed automation without months of runway
English as Code. AP first, Epicor-native.
Collaborative integration
JBI and Kognitos treated the program as a joint operating initiative, not a one-off IT ticket. Accounts payable invoice automation, wired directly between Kognitos and Epicor, became the first production win, replacing a slow manual matching, coding, and approval path. Employees who previously lived inside repetitive tasks could refocus on supplier relationships and exceptions.
Calvert highlighted how responsiveness and disciplined follow-up built confidence to expand: “The team has been very good at responding… and with proper follow up gave us confidence to ramp things up further.” Encouraged by the initial outcomes, JBI is extending Kognitos into adjacent flows such as sales order entry and quote building.
Cultural integration
Introducing AI stirred a mix of reactions, especially across generations, but practical wins won the organization over. Starting with AP was a conscious choice to pick what Calvert described as “fruit on the ground”: processes that were obviously manual yet well bounded, proving value before tackling harder edge workflows.
