Teneo: Four companies, one payment chain

Teneo is bringing Northern Norway’s fibre companies together under one locally owned group. Each company that joins brings its own customers, mandates and systems. Billogram runs the payment chain for all of them, so a new company is added to an existing setup instead of rebuilding it.

“It works better than invoicing has ever worked for us.”

Nils-Arne Stikholmen, CFO, Teneo

Fibre that grew up inside a power company

Trollfjord Bredbånd started in 2002 as the broadband part of a municipally owned power company in Stokmarknes. Like many fibre companies in the north, it inherited the power company’s systems, including the whole payment chain. Both platforms it used were built for electricity customers. “Many energy groups have used it over the years, but it was never very broadband-friendly,” says Nils-Arne Stikholmen, CFO, about the first. About the second: “It was really a power-oriented solution, that one too.”

Small changes had to be ordered from the supplier and waited for. Reports were hard to produce. The previous billing platform was integrated with Salesforce, but the setup meant that parts of the business logic remained within the billing system. Teneo wanted a more flexible architecture where Salesforce could play the central role in customer management and business logic.

Why Teneo chose a platform it could build on

The initial dialogue with Billogram was started by Teneo Digital’s former CEO. Teneo’s in-house developers were later brought into the evaluation process, where they reviewed Billogram’s API and documentation and found it solid. “It was far better documented than what we had seen before,” says Stikholmen.

Customer data stays in Salesforce. Billogram receives the invoice data and runs everything from there: distribution, AvtaleGiro, KID references, reminders, collection, and the payouts to Teneo.

“Salesforce runs everything. That is why the APIs matter so much to us.”

Nils-Arne Stikholmen, CFO, Teneo

The first year

Teneo went live in March 2024, as one of Billogram’s first customers in Norway. The integration itself worked quickly, but parts of the finance workflow took longer. Refunds were manual, and the customer ledger the finance team had expected was not there yet. “The first two months were a bit tough,” says Stikholmen.

Teneo was open about it. Billogram released refunds and overpayment handling for Norway, and a company ledger that came out of what Teneo and other Norwegian customers asked for. In the meantime, Teneo built the ledger reports its finance team needed in Salesforce, on top of the API.

The soft reminder, sent without a fee three days after the due date, does most of the work: six in ten invoices that get one are paid before any collection notice goes out. In total, 97 percent of Teneo’s invoices are paid before any fee applies, and over 99 percent never reach debt collection.

Adding a company without rebuilding the chain

In January 2026, Hammerfest Energi Bredbånd joined Teneo. In May 2026, Hammerfest’s customers were in Salesforce and invoiced through Billogram, with the same configuration as the other Teneo companies.

“We got Hammerfest into Salesforce in May and invoiced their customers the same month. We are starting to get a template for how we do it.”

Nils-Arne Stikholmen, CFO, Teneo

Growing without losing the local feeling

Customers in Harstad and Hammerfest were used to a local company, and Teneo wants them to keep feeling that way. Offices stay in the communities Teneo serves, and customer service is meant to grow more slowly than the number of customers. Hammerfest’s customer service team now works in the same system as the rest of Teneo. “We feel local. We just cover a bigger area than before,” says Nora Enoksen, Head of Customer Service.

Trude Cecilie Blokhus has handled invoice questions in customer service through all three platforms. “I used to fight to get functions in place. Now I simply say what I need, and it gets implemented, thanks to our dedicated development team and the ability to build our own APIs. In my view, returning to the old system would set our development back several steps.”

The ambition is to double the customer base without doubling the team. “We can take in ten thousand new customers without growing customer service. That is the big difference. With the right systems, costs do not grow in step with revenue,” says Stikholmen.

What comes next

Teneo’s goal is to become the largest broadband provider in Northern Norway. “Owning the digital foundation gives us control, and secures emergency preparedness, jobs and, not least, returns to our owners,” says Steffan Larsen, CEO. “We will be the guarantor that it stays in Northern Norwegian hands, and ownership is the key.”

“A partner has to understand what we are doing and add value for us. They should help us run efficiently, with solutions that fit well with ours and automate as many processes as possible. They also have to adapt quickly when things change, and be pragmatic enough to bend their own principles now and then to keep a customer happy.”

Steffan Larsen, CEO, Teneo

Teneo and Billogram in numbers

• Four companies on one payment chain

• New company up and running on the payment chain within a month

• 97% paid before any reminder fee applies 

• Over 99% never reach debt collection

• 60% of invoices that get a soft reminder are paid before the collection notice