René van der Meij, CTO at SBR Nexus, shares his experiences
SBR Nexus is a nonprofit organization founded by the three major banks—ABN AMRO, ING, and Rabobank—with the goal of enabling the uniform exchange of business data between companies and banks. René van der Meij serves as CTO and explains how the partnership with SureSync is helping them achieve this mission.
“For us, it was crucial to align our taxonomies with the Dutch standard and to be able to update them continuously. SureSync has really made a difference in that regard.”
The Reason for the Collaboration
SBR Nexus has long used XBRL taxonomies through the SBR agreement framework, a public-private partnership that also includes the Tax and Customs Administration and the Chamber of Commerce. However, the existing architecture of their taxonomies was lagging behind developments in the Dutch taxonomy.
“We noticed that we were spending a lot of time updating our reports to stay in line with the Chamber of Commerce’s reporting requirements and that our architecture no longer fully aligned with the Dutch taxonomy. That was the moment for us to do things differently.”
Following a competitive bidding process, SureSync was selected, primarily because of its ability to keep taxonomies up to date and immediately adapt to new requirements, such as the mandatory reporting for medium-sized legal entities.
How the Collaboration Works
The onboarding process went smoothly, and we collaborated closely from the very beginning. SureSync delivered an initial version of the taxonomy that was already fully aligned with the Chamber of Commerce, after which further coordination took place.
“Instead of constantly discussing individual points, SureSync provided a complete version, and we were able to build on that. That worked very efficiently for us.”
After 10 years, the collaboration remains very active: SBR Nexus collects changes and requests from banks and software vendors, discusses them with SureSync, and incorporates them step by step into the taxonomy.
“The combination of SureSync’s technical expertise and our team’s domain knowledge is a huge help in ensuring everything is properly aligned.”
What Makes the Product Special
Support for all XBRL specifications enables us to develop complete taxonomies that are optimally aligned with our business requirements. For us, the taxonomy serves as a reliable foundation for the exchange of high-quality financial data.
"This product is truly designed to capture high-quality data. It ensures that the technical aspects are always correct and that you have a partner who knows what they’re doing."
Reliability and Quality
René emphasizes the importance of reliable partners in the financial sector:
"Reliability, transparency, and quality are core values for us. SureSync delivers on these and has local knowledge of the Dutch market, so we can be sure that everything is correct."
Although the product itself doesn’t directly result in measurable time or cost savings, it offers certainty and continuity when aligning complex financial taxonomies.
Looking Ahead
SBR Nexus continues to look ahead and is exploring new developments in taxonomies, such as the Open Information Model (OIM), to tackle future challenges together with SureSync.
"You can’t expect improvement if you stand still. We’re always looking for ways to optimize and support the taxonomies so that all parties required to submit data can do so reliably and easily."
René van der Meij, CTO SBR Nexus
As a knowledge partner and chain manager, SBR Nexus brings parties such as the government, the business community and the financial sector together to reach agreements regarding the exchange of information. These agreements are
published in the form of data products, enabling structured data (based on our standards with definitions and validations) to be exchanged between companies and financiers in a secure, reliable and efficient manner.
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