A success Story: How Lean Technologies Streamlined Financial Operations with Wafeq’s Automation Tools



Lean Technologies has become a key player in building the infrastructure powering MENA’s fintech expansion. As the company processes billions in payments and connects hundreds of thousands of bank accounts, its internal finance operations faced increasing pressure to keep pace. With growing regulatory requirements, higher transaction volumes, and the complexity of managing multiple entities, the Lean finance team turned to Wafeq to automate, streamline, and scale their accounting and compliance functions.

In a conversation with Nabil Dar, Lean’s VP of Finance, we explored how Wafeq helped transform the company’s accounts payable processes, accelerate month-end close, simplify reconciliation, and ensure compliance across multiple jurisdictions.

Building the Infrastructure Behind MENA's Fintech Boom

Lean tech is building the next generation of financial infrastructure to unlock innovation in the Middle East region,” the team explains.

Our API based platform is there to help other fintechs unlock the benefits of a more open and integrated financial ecosystem, whether it's accessing customer bank account data with their permission or being able to initiate payments. Lean is there to support that infrastructure across various use cases.

As Lean scales, they’ve noticed trends shaping the region’s fintech growth. “There’s a multitude of trends,” they note, “but the three that would be picked out are:

• Increasing certainty around regulation, so for lean technologies, it’s open banking and open finance regulation.
• Demographics and an increasingly digital-first native population.
• Governmental directives, such as Saudi Vision 2030. These are three trends that are powering fintech innovation in the region.

Watch the full interview below

Operational Challenges Before Wafeq

Like many early-stage finance teams, Lean encountered several operational hurdles during its growth journey. As an early-stage finance team, certainly in the fintech space, there are a multitude of challenges:

• The ability to stay on top of an increasing load of transactional volumes.
• Ensuring that there is visibility on operations.
• Ensuring that there is sufficient clarity on financial results.

“Before automating many of these things, Lean was stuck, like many finance teams in spreadsheets, emails, and instant messages. Automation was the key to unlocking and bringing these systems together, ensuring that there is a single source of truth, and it could rely on the accuracy and clarity of the information they were providing to power the business.

The team described their accounts payable (AP) process as entirely manual.

We would rely on approvals via emails, we would rely on cross-referencing spreadsheets, manually entering details into our online banking portal, and then reconciling this in the accounting system.

Wafeq’s Impact on Accounts Payable Automation

That all changed with the implementation of Wafeq. Wafeq automation has helped Lean Technologies in the accounts payable space. The transformation was not just functional, it was measurable. Since fully implementing Wafeq across all of Lean's entities, enabling the account payables workflow and other automations within the platform, these are the key benefits:

1. Centralized Accounts Payable Workflow Moving to the account payables automation with Wafeq has allowed Lean to put all of those various steps into one platform, where having full visibility over which invoices need to be paid to suppliers, when they are due, and ensuring they are paid on time, which is super important in building healthy relationships with suppliers.
2. 50% Reduction in Month-End Close Time Since fully implementing Wafeq across all of Lean's entities, enabling the account payables workflow and other automations within the platform, they have reduced the month-end close period by 50%.
3. Streamlined Approvals and Spending Control Wafeq automation has helped in the accounts payable space, whether automating or streamlining approvals, ensuring the right people have visibility over what needs to be spent and control over allowing that spend.
4. Bulk Payments with One-Click Efficiency The ability to initiate multiple or bulk payments has also been a game changer. Rather than having to go in one by one, enter multiple details and references, and check multiple boxes, this can now be done almost with one click. We upload the invoices, generate bulk payment instructions, get the approval, and are ready to go.”

Improvements in Reconciliation and Reporting

Significant improvements were observed in reconciliation and reporting processes with Wafeq's adoption. As a regulated company, financial compliance had been considered a critical priority at Lean. Through Wafeq, much of the reconciliation required for the books, such as matching accounts receivable and payable, was streamlined. The reconciliation process was accelerated by surfacing transactions from the bank account directly within the platform and enabling automatic matching with invoices or purchase orders already raised. The automation feature, which was regarded as the most valuable, automatically checked amounts against the best estimate, thereby supporting faster reconciliation. As a result, notable time and cost savings were achieved, alongside improved efficiency. These are the Key Improvements Wafeq help with in points:

• Streamlined reconciliation of receivables and payables through Wafeq’s platform.
• Faster reconciliation is enabled by automatching bank transactions to invoices or purchase orders.
• Automation of amount-checking against best estimates, accelerating reconciliation.
• Time and cost savings, with gains in operational efficiency.

Compliance and Multi-Entity Management

Operating in the MENA region has required rigorous attention to compliance, particularly with entities based in Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Early-stage finance teams' expertise is often limited due to local accounting and tax laws. Across all jurisdictions, Wafeq’s automation was credited for enabling timely, accurate reporting and streamlining compliance processes for regulated entities:

• Local VAT laws in the UAE and Saudi Arabia were complied with through the platform's use, which enabled VAT returns generation and accelerated quarterly tax filings.
• The complexity of managing multiple entities across jurisdictions was addressed through tooling, automation, and structured implementation.
• Non-negotiable requirements such as local processes, internal controls, and regulatory understanding were upheld using Wafeq’s system, which simplified reporting and compliance, whether in VAT regulations for Saudi Arabia or withholding tax obligations elsewhere.
• Compliance with ZATCA’s e-invoicing requirements was ensured through Wafeq’s integration, supporting accurate and lawful invoicing for Saudi-based customers. Lean’s expansion into Saudi Arabia depended heavily on such functionality.

Wafeq has really helped us in automating that process, by automating the reports and downloading it through the click of an instant so that way we can ensure that our compliance is done accurately and efficiently and a smooth process.

The Measurable Impact

Wafeq's implementation brought more than just operational convenience, it achieved clear and measurable improvements. Payment processing times, which previously required 2–3 hours, were reduced significantly, enhancing both speed and ease of work.

The time required to ensure timely supplier payments was also reduced, and greater confidence was established in the accuracy and compliance of submitted regulatory and financial returns. Operational efficiency was elevated across the board.

The payments which we used to take like 2–3 hours, now can be done in 10 seconds of time, and at an ease of work as well.

Wafeq’s automation enabled these efficiencies to be realized at scale, delivering tangible value to financial operations.

Advice to Other Fintech Teams

A clear takeaway emerged from Lean’s transformation: automation should not be delayed. The benefits of early adoption became evident as operations scaled.

Manual workarounds and ad-hoc workflows are often allowed to persist in early-stage companies, but by time inefficiencies surface, implementing automation becomes more difficult.

A strong recommendation was made: automation should be introduced as early as possible to build a solid foundation for compliance and scalability.

My advice to other fintech teams looking to scale their finance function is: don't leave automation too late. The earlier you do it, the better.

With automation embedded early, organizations are better positioned to operate efficiently and align with their broader growth strategies.

Lean’s experience with Wafeq exemplifies how fintech companies in MENA can scale faster, improve efficiency, and stay compliant. all through the power of automation. As one team member put it:

We’re Lean, building the infrastructure behind MENA’s fintech boom.

And with the right tools like Wafeq, they’re doing just that.