American Express acquires Center to simplify expense tracking for businesses

By Gloria Methri

American Express has agreed to acquire Center, a software company modernising expense management. Center’s software, together with American Express’ corporate and small business cards, will aim to create a seamless expense management platform that delivers more value across the commercial card payments process – from choice in premium card offerings and rewards to automated accounting and reconciliation.

“As a leader in corporate and small business cards, it is our job to deliver innovative products and services that help customers run their businesses more efficiently,” said Raymond Joabar, Group President, Global Commercial Services at American Express. “By integrating Center’s outstanding talent and technology, we can save our customers time and money and strengthen our leadership position in commercial card payments.”

“Center was founded with the mission to drive simplicity in the user experience and make expense management as effortless as swiping your card. Since 2018, our team has built industry-leading software and delivered strong results for our customers,” said Naveen Singh, CEO and Co-founder of Center. “We have always believed that card and expense management should be deeply linked, and we believe that even more great work can be done by incorporating our capabilities and talent into American Express.”

Center’s software is designed to remove friction from the expense management process. It gives businesses real-time visibility into all employee spending, automates manual accounting tasks, streamlines expense submissions and reporting, and equips finance teams with the tools and insights needed to optimise decision-making better.

With an integrated card and expense management solution, American Express aims to help customers:

• Delight employees: Provide employees with the ability to easily manage expenses through a mobile-friendly, automated app and empower them to spend on the go with confidence.
• Automate tasks: The customisable expense management program will help businesses save time reviewing, auditing and posting expenses to the general ledger. Center customers see their finance teams free up an average of 90% of the time previously spent on these tasks.
•  Ensure compliance and maximise rewards: Business owners and CFOs will be able to confidently ensure their company’s spending remains fully compliant with company policy, while getting more value from their American Express card program.

The acquisition is expected to close within the second quarter of 2025, subject to customary closing conditions.