In a space filled with buzzwords like "intelligent automation" and "AI-powered workflows," it's easy to lose sight of what actually makes great software work—especially in enterprise environments with massive invoice volume, strict compliance needs, and cross-departmental complexity.
At Ascend, building a platform that delivers real results in this landscape means solving hard problems, not just automating simple ones. And a big part of that vision comes from Dewayne Richardson, our very own Principal Architect, who’s been in software development for over 20 years.
We sat down with Dewayne to understand the technical thinking behind Ascend’s platform, and how his team approached building something that doesn’t just process invoices—but handles complexity at scale.
A Generalist’s Approach to Complex Problems
“I’m a Principal Architect and have been in software development for 20+ years,” Dewayne shares. “I consider myself a generalist—so whatever the job needs in the moment. It can include anything from software architecture and project leadership to team documentation or code reviews. It all depends on what’s needed.”
That flexible mindset shows up in how Ascend approaches both product strategy and platform architecture.
Starting with the Problem: Enterprise Invoice Complexity
“When I first joined Ascend, what stood out most to me was the complexity of invoices, and how every company manages their invoice processing in various and unique ways,” Dewayne explains.
That early insight helped shape how the team architected Ascend. Rather than build a rigid system around one use case, Dewayne and the engineering team focused on building a processing model flexible enough to scale across industries like healthcare, education, and finance.
“We started by identifying the core processing model required for the platform by asking a few key questions,” he says. “For example: Is this a real-time system, where high-volume transactional throughput is critical, or a workflow system, where visibility, repeatability, and accountability matter most?”
“Understanding this distinction allowed us to architect the system with the right priorities—whether that meant optimizing for speed and scale, or traceability and user interaction.”
Engineering for Resilience, Not Just Speed
While performance is always important, Dewayne makes it clear that true enterprise-grade software has to be resilient.
“One of the biggest challenges is ensuring reliability as failures arise. We have to design for resilience,” he says. “When errors occur, how do we recover gracefully with minimal downtime or disruption to the customer experience? This requires robust error handling, retry logic, and the ability to isolate failures without impacting the entire workflow.”
That resilience is a foundational part of how Ascend delivers consistent performance for large-scale AP teams—without disruption or bottlenecks.
“This is essential for building fault-tolerant systems,” he adds.
What Makes Ascend’s Automation Different?
“A lot of tools claim to be intelligent, but what we’re focused on is using AI to make our invoice recognition and prediction results more accurate,” Dewayne explains.
“We want to move beyond basic OCR and rule-based systems by leveraging machine learning models that understand the structure and intent of invoices across various vendors.”
That means smarter field extraction, better classification, and predictive logic that aligns with a customer’s specific rules—not generic automation.
“We’ve focused on improving field extraction accuracy, as well as training prediction models that can assist our customers with their custom invoice rules. By leveraging AI, we’re not just automating invoice processing—we’re making our systems smarter over time.”
Culture That Powers the Platform
When asked what makes the engineering process at Ascend different, Dewayne doesn’t talk about tools or frameworks—he talks about ownership.
“The engineering team's culture is focused on adaptability and ownership to empower individuals to make decisions without a command-and-control center,” he says.
“Everyone on the team feels a sense of responsibility not just for writing code, but for making sure what we build actually solves the right problem and performs well in production.”
That cultural mindset shapes how Ascend approaches scalability. “The focus on building quality—‘go slow to go fast’—allows us to build systems that can run reliably on their own. That foundation gives us the freedom to scale without constantly getting pulled back to fix issues in poorly built components.”
Final Thought
Ascend was built to handle the most difficult AP automation challenges—where invoices are complex, workflows are customized, and the stakes are high. What Dewayne and his team have architected isn’t just software that automates — it’s software that endures, adapts, and improves.
By combining deep technical expertise with a culture of accountability, Ascend is redefining what it means to offer the best accounts payable automation software — especially for Workday customers operating at enterprise scale.
Because when it comes to accounts payable automation for enterprises, complexity isn’t the problem. It’s the challenge we were built for.
Want to see more about how we make AP Magic happen? Check out our “How it Works Page” here, or you can always schedule a quick demo with one of our experts for a time that works for you.
