France’s QONTO shuts down REGATE: accounting becomes a platform battleground

Within the space of a few days, QONTO has dominated the headlines with a succession of strategically significant announcements: first, its acquisition of ACASI through proceedings before the Paris Commercial Court, followed by the forthcoming launch of a certified accounting service integrated directly into its platform.

At the same time, another project has been moving forward far more quietly. By the end of the summer, QONTO will discontinue REGATE, the pre-accounting solution it acquired in 2022 for SMEs and accounting firms. Designed to automate document collection, bank reconciliation and collaboration between businesses and their accountants, REGATE had until now been one of the fintech’s main accounting products.

Users are gradually discovering that REGATE will disappear in favour of a single environment integrated into QONTO. Several firms have criticised the particularly tight timetable, features that remain incomplete in QONTO’s accountant portal and a migration they will have to manage while the e-invoicing reform is already placing considerable demands on their teams. Discussions published on social media in recent days reveal significant discontent among parts of the profession.

When contacted by FW.MEDIA, QONTO made no attempt to distance itself from the decision. “The decision to gradually discontinue this solution is independent of the ACASI acquisition. It reflects our intention to simplify our offering by concentrating development on a single platform integrated into QONTO.”

Anger extending far beyond REGATE

For accounting firms, REGATE was not simply an invoice-uploading tool but a link in their production chain. Its disappearance means retraining teams, supporting clients, rebuilding processes and absorbing a temporary decline in productivity.

There is an additional complication. QONTO has confirmed that the history of customer invoices, expense reports and purchase requests will not be transferred automatically to its new platform. The data can be downloaded, but users will be responsible for importing it themselves. With the widespread rollout of e-invoicing already under way, many firms see this as a substantially underestimated transition cost.

A coherent strategy nonetheless

From an industrial perspective, the decision makes sense. Maintaining several platforms simultaneously means financing multiple technical architectures, product roadmaps and development teams. REGATE’s two co-founders had, incidentally, already left the company early last year to create Allia. In the future, it would also mean maintaining several distinct AI layers. By concentrating development on a single platform, QONTO is following a conventional rationalisation strategy.

The acquisition of ACASI, the launch of an integrated certified accounting service and the disappearance of REGATE are all chapters in the same story: that of a company moving away from assembling separate software components to build a unified financial infrastructure.

Dialogue becomes more difficult

QONTO says it wants to strengthen its collaboration with accountants and notes that more than 10,000 firms already use its accountant portal. On the ground, however, many see REGATE’s disappearance as evidence that the product roadmap is now designed primarily for entrepreneurs.

That is the central paradox of this episode. Where QONTO sees the rationalisation of its architecture, accounting firms see the disappearance of a production tool and the operational costs that follow.

Accounting becomes a platform battleground

Beyond REGATE, the entire architecture of the market is being reshaped. For decades, each player occupied a clearly defined territory: banks managed accounts and payments, software vendors developed applications, and accountants produced financial statements and advised their clients.

E-invoicing and artificial intelligence are now breaking that structure apart. Financial data are generated directly within platforms, circulate in real time and feed functions that were previously handled by separate providers.

Competition therefore no longer merely pits banks, software vendors and accounting firms against one another. It increasingly brings integrated platforms face to face, each seeking to become the business leader’s single interface. QONTO is progressively expanding its offering to include certified accounting. PENNYLANE combines banking, accounting production and financial management within the same environment. INDY is pursuing a similar strategy by continually broadening its business-management features, while major ERP vendors are adding financial services and AI capabilities.

All are pursuing the same objective: becoming the financial operating system for SMEs. In this race, accounting is no longer a standalone product but one component of a platform integrating banking, payments, e-invoicing, cash management, financing, business steering and artificial intelligence. The true strategic asset is therefore no longer the accounting software itself, but the platform that concentrates usage, data and, in the future, AI agents.

Accountants remain indispensable, but no longer in quite the same role

QONTO’s strategy is not, however, intended to replace accountants. The company is adopting a division of responsibilities consistent with current technological developments. The most standardised tasks, including document collection, account coding, bank reconciliation and preparation of tax filings, are gradually being absorbed by automation, e-invoicing and AI.

Tax advice, financing transactions, restructuring, acquisitions, wealth planning and strategic management, by contrast, remain high-value activities. The profession is therefore gradually shifting from producing accounts to advising business leaders on strategic decisions.

REGATE may only be the first domino

In the short term, REGATE’s disappearance will primarily be remembered by accounting firms as an expensive transition, forcing them to absorb a complex migration just as e-invoicing is already consuming their teams’ attention. An industrial strategy may be coherent without being any less costly for those required to bear its operational consequences.

But the broader issue lies elsewhere. REGATE is probably the first symptom of a transformation in which financial platforms gradually absorb functions previously divided among banks, software vendors and accounting firms. For the latter, the challenge will be to remain the business leader’s trusted adviser, even as platforms seek to become the interface through which that leader works every day.