NSG&B roadmap milestones

About the roadmap milestones

In the NSG&B Implementation Plan 2021-2024, there is outlined a set of roadmap milestones. The roadmap milestones are quite broad societal level milestones that are derived from the NSG&B vision of creating value by making real-time business data accessible and usable for innovation and growth across the region in an automatic, consent-based and secure manner.

The 8 roadmap milestones

The 8 roadmap milestones from the NSG&B Implementation Plan 2021–2024 are as follows:

By 2021, a public-private advisory board has been established to support the implementation of the NSG roadmap.
By 2022, 70% of the Nordic SMEs use a digital business system.
By 2023, SMEs can freely choose to move their business data between business systems.
By 2023, sales and purchases can be handled digitally by default in compatible formats across the Nordic region.
By 2023, 80% of the Nordic business systems have implemented common tools (APIs), and so service providers can access an SME’s data with appropriate consent.
By 2024, 80% of the invoices sent in the Nordics are digital.
By 2025, the Nordic SMEs have saved EUR 500 million by using smart services and real-time data.
By 2027, the Nordic countries are the most integrated region in the world.

The purpose of the roadmap milestones

In the NSG&B Implementation Plan, the roadmap milestones are set up to monitor the success of the programme, e.g. regarding the percentage of uptake of solutions and services. Some of the milestones express direct results of the NSG collaboration, other milestones are targets which are needed to reach in order to realise the vision, such as a high number of SMEs using digital business systems. It is stated that “this is obviously a goal which cannot be achieved by NSG public partners alone, but as many other needed changes, must be pursued in collaboration with private parties”.

Thus, the roadmap milestones are setup as a “proxy” in order to include the wider ecosystem effects of the programme, but the progress on these milestones cannot be attributed to the programme alone but must be seen in a wider context of factors - tech, regulative, market development in each of the countries as well as on an EU and global level even.

In the appendix, each of the roadmap milestones are examined, and for each milestone there is described: the NSG&B contribution, the market and tech trends as well as country-specific initiatives or events that have contributed to the progress for each milestone. In the below sections there is a summary of this, and thus the further definitions and details can be found in the appendix.

The roadmap milestones each refer to different time periods in 2021-2027. Thus, for some of the milestones, it is possible to document only the likelihood of achieving the milestones and what the NSG&B contribution has been in this regard.

An overview of the eight NSG&B roadmap milestones

Table 6: Overview of the eight NSG&B roadmap milestones

Eight roadmap milestones	Result
1. By 2021, a public-private advisory board has been established to support the implementation of the NSG roadmap	✔ The NSG&B Nordic Advisory Board was set up, and national advisory boards are set up in the field as well.
2. By 2022, 70% of the Nordic SMEs use a digital business system	✔ The milestone that in 2022, 70% of the Nordic SMEs use a digital business system, can be considered to be met in 2024, however, with some methodological reservations. According to Eurostat, shares of Nordic SMEs that use any digital business system range between 43-69%, and a bit higher - from 49-73% - for ERP systems. However, national surveys show different results ranging from 79% in Sweden, around 80% in Finland and 83% in Iceland. Moreover, in Norway, it is mandatory for all businesses to do their Tax Declaration using a digital business system, and in Denmark a certified digital bookkeeping system has been made mandatory for all businesses with more than DKK 300,000 in sales for two consecutive years from 2025 onwards. NSG&B has contributed by adding to the cross-border features of having a digital business system - in particular a digital bookkeeping system.
3. By 2023, sales and purchases can be handled digitally by default in compatible formats across the Nordic region.	✔ If this milestone is defined as SMEs having the possibility to handle their sales and purchases digitally by default in the Nordic region, then the milestone is met. However, going a step further, if the milestone is defined as SMEs in practice doing their transactions fully automated using a compatible format as the Peppol network, then this practice is not widespread at this point.
4. By 2023, SMEs can freely choose to move their business data between business systems.	✔ This milestone has been met due to a combination of market solutions combined with the valuable NSG&B contribution of a “translation” of financial terms between the Nordic countries and combined efforts of the Finnish RTE project with the AAV-model. This can, for example, lower the costs of changing from one business system to another for the individual SME, and it can contribute to long-term competition and the integration of the Nordic market in this field.
5. By 2023, 80% of the Nordic business systems have implemented common tools (APIs), so service providers can access an SME’s data with appropriate consent.	✔ Based on the fact that all main system providers of bookkeeping ERP-systems in the Nordic region have APIs and other solutions available for SMEs to share their data with third parties, it can be concluded that this milestone is met. Market & tech development has been contributing to this milestone because APIs are now a mainstream component of most systems and platforms globally. National business registries in the Nordic countries all allow for API-integrations so the market can develop different services for SMEs. The NSG&B Nordic API can be expanded and make use of the work concerning the translation of financial terms, so that there is an easy and safe-to-use way of comparing and accessing Nordic companies basic data, compliance and publicly available financial performance.
6. By 2024, 80% of the invoices sent in the Nordics are digital	Partly met If we define the milestone as being about the very ability to automate these business administration processes, then the Eurostat indicator for eInvoices that are suitable for automatic processing should be a good fit for this milestone. According to this, Finland and Norway meet this milestone in 2023. Notably, the past five years have seen a 20 percentage points increase in the share of companies that send eInvoices in Finland, Norway and Sweden. As part of Swedish Bolagsverket’s efforts on eInvoicing they have conducted a range of interviews with companies. An example of the progress on eInvoicing and its savings potential is a company that has increased the percentage of eInvoices from 14% to 67%, aiming to reach 95% by 2024. If they achieve this goal, they are expected to save nearly 200,000 SEK excluding VAT this year, with a savings of between 1.50 and 7.00 SEK per invoice. In addition to the direct cost savings, there is also a significant savings in work hours. Each paper invoice takes at least 5 minutes to process, equating to a cost of approximately 83 SEK per invoice, based on an hourly wage of 1,000 SEK. If the company processes, for example, 10,000 invoices annually, the transition to e-invoicing could result in additional savings of over 800,000 SEK per year in labor costs alone. Market & tech development has been contributing to this milestone by offering possibilities for eInvoicing in digital ERP-systems. While Nordic countries have efforts to expand use of eInvoicing, there is not currently any requirement for businesses to use these features, as such a mandate would require a derogation from the VAT directive. The currently ongoing revision of the VAT directive - VAT in the Digital Age (VIDA), can result in a repeal of this restriction, allowing all EU members to introduce mandatory e-invoicing. NSG&B has contributed to this milestone by its work on supporting interoperable eDocuments in the Nordics.
7. By 2025, the Nordic SMEs have saved EUR 500 million by using smart services and real-time data	✔ This milestone points to 2025, thus we can only point to estimations at this point. In Finland, the estimated benefits of a fully up and running real time economy ecosystem are approximately 6 billion euros annually (roughly 0.5% of the GDP). Estimation is based on external studies commissioned by the RTE program, interviews with public and private actors and experiments implemented in the RTE program. In Denmark, the cost-savings of digital bookkeeping and annual reporting is estimated to approximately 400 million euros annually. Furthermore, it should be noted that, according to a study referred to be the OECD (Tax Administration 3.0), decreasing administrative work in SMEs increases business activity by 4%. In 2026, there will be a fuller picture of actual savings coming from the Danish Bookkeeping Act, that can be used to quantify this 2025 milestone. Based on the estimation from 2022 alone, however, that Danish SMEs are to save close to EUR 400 million annually by 2025, it can be expected that the rest of the Nordic region will have savings for well more than EUR 100 million in 2025, thus reaching this milestone of EUR 500 million in annual savings in the Nordic region in 2025. The savings potential could thus be expected to be more than EUR 500 million annually, but these are estimates for 2025, and it remains to be documented in full-scale on a national and Nordic level what the actual savings amount to. Market & tech development has been contributing to this milestone by constantly offering new and improved solutions on smart and real time data. In the context of the NGS&B programme, focus has been on digitalisation and automation of core business processes and most concretely in bookkeeping systems.
8. By 2027, the Nordic countries are the most integrated region in the world	Difficult to measure This milestone points to 2027, and it is only possible to point to the NSG&B contributions to this vision at this point. The NSG&B programme has contributed to the Nordic Council of Ministers’ 2030 vision; and specifically the strategic priority of a “competitive Nordic Region, that will promote green growth in the Nordic region based on knowledge, innovation, mobility and digital integration” by enabling SME data sharing that is of high quality, accessible and automatic; shared and stored in a consent-based and secure manner as well as working in cross-border situations. On a more broad note, the NSG&B programme has had a long-term contribution to the developing of national digital solutions and infrastructure in a way that is interoperable and makes sense in relation to existing and upcoming initiatives in the other Nordic countries, in the EU and in the rest of the world.

Conclusion on the eight roadmap milestones

In total, it is concluded that six of the eight milestones have been met at this point in 2024, since it is not clear at this point whether 80% of invoices in the Nordic region are eInvoices at this point – and whether the Nordic region is indeed the most integrated in the world – is beyond the scope for this report.

A clear increase in SMEs having a digital bookkeeping system & using eInvoices

There is a clear increase in the percentage of SMEs having a digital bookkeeping system and SMEs that use eInvoicing in the Nordic region. It should be noted, however, that progress is measured by a range of Eurostat indicators and contrasted with national surveys in the area, however, the direction and trend of progress on these milestones are clear – all Nordic countries experience a high rise in the percentages of SMEs having a digital bookkeeping system and using eInvoices (roadmap milestones 2 and 6).

The necessary conditions are in place for digitalisation to continue

Moreover, it is concluded that the necessary technological conditions are in place for SMEs to take into use, these being that there are possibilities available for sales and purchases to be handled digitally by default in compatible formats across the Nordic region; and that SMEs can freely choose to move their business data between business systems and are able to give access to their business data in ERP-systems to third parties using APIs or more simple user logins (roadmap milestone 3, 4, 5).

Regarding the broader milestones of saving SMEs EUR 500 million annually and the Nordic region being the most integrated in the world, we can point to estimations at this point. In Finland, the estimated benefits of a fully up and running real time economy ecosystem are approximately 6 billion euros annually (roughly 0.5% of the GDP). Estimation is based on external studies commissioned by the RTE program, interviews with public and private actors and experiments implemented in the RTE program. In Denmark, the cost-savings of digital bookkeeping and annual reporting is estimated to approximately 400 million euros annually. In 2026, there will be a fuller picture of actual savings coming from the Danish Bookkeeping Act, that can be used to quantify this 2025 milestone. Moreover, it should be noted that, according to a study by the OECD (Tax Administration 3.0), decreasing administrative work in SMEs increases business activity by 4%.

The long-term contribution

Regarding the Nordic Council of Ministers’ 2030 vision that is the overarching vision in this field, the NSG&B programme has contributed to the strategic priority of a “competitive Nordic Region, that will promote green growth in the Nordic region based on knowledge, innovation, mobility and digital integration” by enabling SME data sharing that is of high quality, accessible and automatic; shared and stored in a consent-based and secure manner as well as working in cross-border situations. Lastly, on a more broad note, the NSG&B programme has had a long-term contribution to the developing of national digital solutions and infrastructure in a way that is interoperable and makes sense in relation to existing and upcoming initiatives in the other Nordic countries, in the EU and in the rest of the world.

In the appendix there is an overview of the eight roadmap milestones and the different contributions from external factors, national efforts and from the NSG&B programme.