Mimaki automates internal process with Power Apps

As Mimaki's digitalization partner, E-mergo developed a mobile app with Power Apps to digitize the expense claim process. With this app, Mimaki employees in the EMEA region can submit expense claims and request approval. In this blog, we discuss the solution for Mimaki and how we built it for them with Power Apps.

Mimaki is a leading manufacturer of wide-format inkjet printers and high-precision cutting plotters. Mimaki's product range includes a fully integrated workflow solution, with hardware, software and consumables. The company has major production facilities in Asia/Pacific, the United States and Europe.

We carried out the assignment for Mimaki Europe B.V., which consists of the European headquarters in the Netherlands and 7 other locations in the EMEA region. Mimaki Europe is responsible for sales, marketing, logistics, administration and managing a large group of field service engineers and a network of distributors and resellers in the EMEA region (Europe, Middle East and Africa).

Mimaki's needs

At Mimaki, various internal processes involving an approval step had not yet been digitized (or only partially), such as submitting expense claims and requesting purchasing budgets. As a result, these processes were not carried out uniformly, there was no overall view of requests and approvals, the risk of errors was high and a relatively large amount of manual work was still required. Mimaki wanted to solve this by using low-code technology.

Mimaki selected Microsoft Power Apps as the platform for digitizing internal approval processes with custom applications that can be used by all employees in Europe.

The first step was to develop an application for claiming project-related expenses incurred by employees during business trips (travel and accommodation costs). Employee expense claims must be reviewed before payment and approved at various levels by their managers. Once a claim has been approved, a PDF and XML file must automatically be sent to the Finance department so that the claim can be imported into the financial administration. The application also had to form a scalable and extensible foundation for adding other similar approval processes, such as requesting purchasing budgets.

Our solution

Using Microsoft's Power Platform, E-mergo developed a solution for the Mimaki employees and managers involved in the expense claim process. The solution consists of a canvas app developed with Power Apps and a number of flows developed with Power Automate.

The app was developed with a mobile user interface, so expense claims can be submitted on both a desktop and a mobile phone. The flows take care of the integrations with Azure AD and Office365 and the automatic routing of requests to the people who need to approve them.

User roles

When the app is opened, the user's role (employee or manager) is determined automatically by looking up the user's details in Mimaki's Azure AD tenant. Based on the user's role, certain functions in the app are hidden, such as the ability to approve expense claims. When submitting a claim, invoices and receipts can easily be added as attachments by uploading a photo or file.

Expense claim process

After an employee submits a request from the app, their direct supervisor (manager) automatically receives an email asking for approval. The email contains the key details of the request and a link that opens the app and displays the details of the request. The manager can then view the details of the request and its attachments in the app and approve or reject it with the click of a button.

When rejecting a claim, a manager can add a comment. Depending on the amount claimed, the request is automatically forwarded after the first approval to the department manager or the managing director for additional approval. The employee then automatically receives an email notifying them of the status change, with a link to the request in the app.

Other functionality

Employees can do more in the app than just claim expenses. They can view the status of pending requests and request an overview of approved requests.

Managers can approve expense claims in the app, but can also submit claims themselves. In addition, managers can set a substitute on a personal profile page in the app for a specific future period when they will be absent (for example during holidays). During that period, the app automatically forwards new requests to the substitute manager for approval. This way, the expense claim process is not only supported digitally, but the process around it has also been improved and made clearer.

Finally, managers and administrators can perform a number of administrative tasks in the app, such as adding projects and linking a department manager to a department.

The benefits for Mimaki

Thanks to the combination of Power Apps and Power Automate, there is no longer any need to work with PDF forms or Excel files or to send emails yourself to request approvals. All data and documents relating to expense claims are stored and retained in a consistent, scalable and sustainable way. The data created by the app is automatically stored in Dataverse, a database in the Azure Cloud that is an integral part of the Power Platform. The data in Dataverse is well secured and can easily be accessed from Power BI for analysis and reporting.

Ready to get started with digitalization and automation?

Many companies still deal with processes that rely heavily on forms, resulting in an unnecessary number of manual actions. Has this blog sparked your interest, and would you like to know more about digitizing and automating such processes with Power Apps? We would be happy to discuss your specific needs in an online introductory meeting.