Automating purchase order processing with AI-powered data extraction
Copaco manages a high daily volume of purchase orders received by email. We built an AI-powered extraction engine that reads incoming orders, converts them into structured data, and presents results to operators for fast validation, removing manual data entry while preserving business-critical accuracy.
Challenge
Copaco's order intake relied on manual processing: operators opened each purchase order, interpreted the document, and entered relevant fields by hand. At Copaco's volume, this created a major bottleneck that was time-consuming, error-prone, and difficult to scale. The wide variation in customer order formats made automation non-trivial, so any solution had to handle diverse layouts and keep humans in the loop where confidence was low.
Solution
We built an AI-powered processing system that automatically extracts structured data from incoming purchase orders, assigns confidence scores to each extracted field, and routes results into a validation interface. Operators get a side-by-side view of source document and extracted values, source highlighting, one-click corrections, and clear approve/reject actions. Corrections are captured and reused to improve model quality over time.
Approach
We started with a focused POC to validate both technical feasibility and operator experience before full-scale implementation. We tested the extraction engine on representative real purchase orders, tracked field-level accuracy against production thresholds, and delivered both a complete architecture design and an operator-interface prototype. This gave Copaco a clear and costed roadmap from POC to production.
Impact
- •Automated extraction handles the full range of purchase order formats across Copaco's customer base.
- •Confidence scoring and source visualisation provide full transparency for each extracted value.
- •The validation interface enables fast review and one-click corrections without slowing down operations.
- •A production-ready architecture provides a clear path to deeper integration and broader document automation.