BlackLine Systems, founded in 2001, is the first and most experienced provider of enterprise software designed to automate and control the entire financial close process.  The first BlackLine module was developed when a client, First National Bank of Nebraska, asked BlackLine for help managing their account reconciliation process.  Like many companies, they were using spreadsheets to manage thousands of reconciliations every month.  In response, BlackLine developed and marketed the first commercially-available software designed specifically for tracking and completing balance sheet account reconciliations.

Headquartered in Los Angeles, with staff in many U.S. locations and clients around the world, BlackLine’s seasoned professionals possess extensive experience in technology and accounting.  Many of our employees have previously worked for BlackLine clients and partners and joined us because they had a passion for the product and what it can do for companies.  As a result, they bring a wealth of practical experience and a strong client perspective to their work each day.

Software as a Service

BlackLine delivers its application over the internet through our SAS 70 Type II Certified BlackLine OnDemand Software as a Service (SaaS) offering.  SaaS makes it easy by not requiring you to buy hardware or install and maintain software.  With outsourcing and cost cutting rampant, more companies are finding internal IT resources to be scarce.  BlackLine solves this problem by providing a completely secure hosted environment for our customer’s processing needs.  All backups, disaster recovery, maintenance, support, etc. is taken care of by the BlackLine team.  This scalable solution allows companies to purchase and use only the software they need.  See our SaaS Benefits page for more information.

Awards & Recognition

Because of the inherent quality of our software, and the exceptional service that we constantly strive to improve, BlackLine (both the company and its products) is growing rapidly and has been the recipient of many awards.  In 2008, BlackLine was No. 300 on the Inc. 500 list of Fastest Growing Private Companies.  In 2009, we moved up to No. 113.  In terms of fastest growing, women-run companies, BlackLine ranked No. 10 in the country.  BlackLine also has been recognized for its excellence by the Los Angeles Business Journal, the San Fernando Valley Business Journal, the Stevie Awards, the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year program, and Nucleus Research.

ROI

Our goal is to provide our clients with exceptional value.  Our application provides unprecedented visibility into the close process, minimizes risk, and maximizes efficiency.  In 2009, two BlackLine clients – AT&T and MeadWestvaco Corp. — were among ten recipients of the prestigious Nucleus ROI awards, alongside heavyweights such as Salesforce.com, Microsoft, and IBM/Cognos.  Nucleus Research independently measures the return on investment (ROI) that companies achieve with technology, and these awards provide a strong validation of the benefits our clients receive.

Commitment to Service

Although BlackLine’s award-winning software is utilized by hundreds of companies, BlackLine has maintained its personal approach to dealing with clients.  BlackLine discovered long ago that the best way to remain successful and profitable was to nurture close relationships with clients and provide them with prompt, superior, and reliable service.   The BlackLine team works closely with our clients to understand their business needs.   Enhancement requests and ideas are continually being incorporated into the software, benefiting all users over time.  The result is an intuitive application that represents the superior practices of some of the top companies in the world.

Clients

At BlackLine, we work with companies of all sizes, across all industries, and around the world.  Our clients range from the Fortune 50 to beyond the Fortune 5000, and companies who use an incredible array of different ERP systems.  We are proud to list such large clients such as AT&T, Boeing, and Costco, but also many smaller companies.   With diversity of clients (and practices) in mind, we have designed our software solution to be incredibly flexible.  With full multi-currency and multi-lingual support, BlackLine facilitates the workflow between global shared services centers and/or outsourcing partners and their business units.

At BlackLine, it’s still about you.