Understanding NetSuite: An In-Depth Guide to Its Functionality and Applications

During the latter part of the 1990s, the term ‘cloud’ was yet to become synonymous with technology. Few could envision it as the driving force behind future software developments.

Nonetheless, certain forward-thinking individuals recognized the untapped potential of delivering software via the internet. Among these pioneers was Oracle’s co-founder Larry Ellison, who managed to instill the vision of web-based software in the mind of entrepreneur Evan Goldberg. As a result, Goldberg initiated the company known as NetLedger in 1998, which would ultimately evolve into the tech giant, NetSuite.

Presently, NetSuite’s cloud-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) platform equips businesses with a comprehensive suite of applications designed to streamline operations and facilitate growth. It caters to organizations varying in size and spanning numerous industries, demonstrating its vast applicability. With NetSuite, companies can effectively leverage a range of functionalities across finance, supply chain, customer relationship management (CRM), human resources, professional services, ecommerce, and more, thus fortifying their business processes.

Understanding NetSuite: Your Comprehensive Guide

NetSuite is a leading software corporation that has built an innovative cloud-based business management platform. This platform is trusted by more than 34,000 burgeoning organizations worldwide. Its primary role is to offer a suite of applications that streamline business operations, enhance business performance insights, and promote substantial efficiency improvements and cost savings.

NetSuite’s robust ERP system supervises integral functions such as finance and accounting, inventory control, order processing, and procurement. Customers have the flexibility to incorporate additional modules, including CRM for sales and marketing automation, human resources (HR) for employee records, performance evaluation, and payroll, professional services automation (PSA) for project planning and monitoring, and omnichannel commerce for seamless online and physical store sales. Each of these modules is connected via a shared database, ensuring real-time data updates that are accessible by authorized users across different business departments.

This shared database empowers business leaders with a holistic, real-time view of their operations, allowing them to identify top-performing processes and departments, as well as areas that require enhancement.

Operating under the software as a service (SaaS) model, NetSuite alleviates customers from the burden of system maintenance and infrastructure responsibilities. This includes tasks such as server procurement and setup, software installation, and deployment of patches and upgrades. Oracle NetSuite handles these operations on behalf of customers, ensuring consistent system updates twice annually.

By eliminating the costs associated with maintenance and upgrades found in on-premises solutions, businesses not only save money but also free up employee time to concentrate on their core mission and customer service.

The SaaS model also facilitates scalability, enabling businesses to incorporate additional functionality as needed without the stress of managing infrastructure and human resources. For instance, a B2B manufacturer could effortlessly integrate NetSuite’s ecommerce module upon deciding to venture into online sales.

In essence, NetSuite provides businesses with unmatched visibility and control, courtesy of a single source of real-time data, and the capability to dynamically add modules as needed. This enhances their operational efficiency and agility, thereby ensuring a competitive edge in the marketplace.

The Genesis and Evolution of NetSuite

NetSuite holds the distinguished title of being the pioneer in the realm of cloud software services.

The journey began in 1998 when Evan Goldberg and a group of partners inaugurated the company, originally named NetLedger – an allusion to the traditional accounting ledgers. Their humble starting point was an office situated above a hair salon in San Mateo, California. The web-hosted NetLedger accounting software laid the groundwork for Goldberg’s vision: an integrated software suite that could supplant the fragmented systems businesses used at the time.

Larry Ellison, co-founder of Oracle and a mentor to Goldberg, was a crucial early proponent. His investment firm, Tako Ventures, committed $125 million to launch the company. Other notable investors included venture capital firm StarVest Partners, software vendor ADP, and PaineWebber Group, a division of the Swiss bank UBS.

In 2002, NetLedger transformed into NetSuite following the addition of inventory management and CRM applications to its service suite. Zach Nelson took the helm as CEO the same year, initiating a period of exponential growth. In the subsequent 14 years, the company saw its annual revenue skyrocket from approximately $1 million to nearly $1 billion.

NetSuite captured significant attention at the onset of 2007 when Billy Beane, celebrated Oakland Athletics General Manager and subject of the best-selling book and film “Moneyball,” joined the board of directors. The year culminated with a successful initial public offering (IPO) on the New York Stock Exchange, where NetSuite issued 6.2 million shares at $26 each, raising over $160 million and earning a market cap of $1.55 billion.

In July 2016, Oracle expressed its intent to acquire NetSuite for $9.3 billion to bolster its transition towards becoming a cloud software provider. After thorough review and approval by independent committees, the acquisition was finalized in November of that year, positioning NetSuite as a Global Business Unit within Oracle.

Since its integration with Oracle, NetSuite has continued to experience rapid growth and now boasts offices and employees across the globe.

Five Distinctive Characteristics of NetSuite

NetSuite, though one of the pioneers, competes with numerous other providers in the realm of cloud ERP software. So what sets NetSuite apart from the crowd? Here are five standout features:

1. Comprehensive Business Overview: NetSuite provides a unified platform from which a company can manage all its operations. It seamlessly integrates finance, supply chain, manufacturing, HR, and ecommerce functionalities into a single system supported by one database. This eliminates the need for disjointed software for each of these functions. With a simple login and a few clicks, employees can monitor and evaluate the performance of any facet of the business.
2. Integrated Native Applications: All applications within NetSuite exchange data with the central database, maintaining a single source of truth. The platform’s native integration negates the need for third-party add-ons that might be unreliable or lack real-time update capabilities. This unified architecture offers a consistent user interface across all modules, thereby reducing training time and boosting productivity. Moreover, it enables users to complete multi-step processes like order-to-cash or procure-to-pay from a single application without the need for re-entry or data export.
3. Genuine Cloud Solution: NetSuite was conceived in and designed for the cloud. Unlike many ‘cloud’ ERP systems that are essentially hosted or hybrid cloud solutions, NetSuite avoids the common issues associated with traditional systems, such as version lock, slow upgrades, and scalability limitations. As a multi-tenant, vendor-managed cloud solution, NetSuite offers limitless potential for growth.
4. Comprehensive Reporting Capabilities: The vast amount of data streaming from various departments and business units into the NetSuite platform powers its robust reporting capabilities. With the system’s built-in reporting tools, users can generate reports on any metric or aspect they wish to assess. Furthermore, NetSuite offers role-based dashboards that provide quick access to essential information, facilitating informed decision-making for employees, managers, and executives alike.
5. Adaptive Flexibility: NetSuite’s broad industry applicability stems not only from its impressive functionality but also from its adaptability to different business requirements. The platform offers customization options through SuiteCloud apps and tools to fit your processes and organizational structure, regardless of whether you’re a multinational corporation with multiple subsidiaries or a startup developing your first product.

Overview of NetSuite Products

NetSuite’s extensive range of modules can cater to the varied requirements of diverse businesses by focusing on critical business functions and processes.

Financial Modules

1. Financial Management: This solution automates many accounting tasks, such as updating the general ledger, tracking receivables and payables, and generating invoices. It accelerates the monthly closing process and facilitates the creation of essential financial reports for statutory and regulatory reporting. Furthermore, it simplifies revenue recognition and consolidates financial statements from subsidiaries, incorporating real-time currency conversion.
2. Global Business Management: NetSuite’s OneWorld caters to multinational and multi-subsidiary firms by managing their entire business operations within a single system. It accommodates the diverse needs of global companies with support for multiple currencies, languages, tax laws, and reporting requirements.
3. Planning and Budgeting: This module provides comprehensive tools for detailed budgeting and forecasting at both departmental and company levels. It also allows financial analysts to use statistical models for running ‘what-if’ scenarios based on various potential outcomes.
4. Billing: SuiteBilling manages invoicing and billing for different transaction models, making financial management for modern businesses less complex. It complies with current revenue recognition standards, facilitating businesses to stay flexible and profitable.

Operational Modules

1. Inventory Management: This module offers a real-time, consolidated view of inventory across all locations and channels, aiding optimal stock management and improving cash flow.
2. Order Management: This solution manages the entire order lifecycle, leading to faster, more accurate fulfillment that reduces shipping costs and enhances customer satisfaction.
3. Procurement: This module enhances the procure-to-pay process, offering granular monitoring of performance and expenditure, thus saving businesses time and money.
4. Warehouse Management System (WMS): It enhances the system’s inventory management capabilities, improving warehouse efficiency and speeding up order fulfillment.
5. Manufacturing: Designed for manufacturers and assemblers, this module provides insights into the production process, ensuring quality, reducing costs, and enhancing on-time delivery.
6. Demand Planning: Using historical data, existing opportunities, or imported sales forecasts, this module aids in planning future demand, automatically creating purchase and work orders based on the demand plan.

Customer Modules

1. Customer Relationship Management (CRM): The CRM module presents a comprehensive view of customers, aiding in managing leads, quotes, and sales. It also improves customer service and helps in targeted marketing.
2. Commerce: SuiteCommerce enables businesses to create exceptional omnichannel shopping experiences. By unifying SuiteCommerce with SuiteCommerce InStore application, it provides a seamless order flow and better customer experiences.

Additional Capabilities

1. SuiteApps: These are applications developed by Oracle NetSuite and partners to extend the capabilities of NetSuite, offering additional functionalities or integrations with other SaaS solutions.
2. Payroll: This module automates payroll processes and ensures compliance with constantly evolving employment laws and regulations.
3. Human Resources: SuitePeople, the HR system, integrates HR data throughout the suite, helping organizations retain top performers and letting employees handle more tasks independently.
4. Professional Services Automation (PSA): Designed for service companies, this system provides project and resource management, billing, time and expense management, and project accounting capabilities.
5. Analytics: SuiteAnalytics utilizes the data in the NetSuite platform to offer in-depth insights, enabling users to build on saved searches and reports with custom filters and visualizations.”

Understanding How NetSuite Operates

NetSuite offers its suite of solutions exclusively through a cloud-based subscription model, demonstrating its enduring commitment to this mode of deployment and dismissing any notion of on-premises options.

Embodying the principle of multi-tenancy, NetSuite enables all its clients to operate on a uniform version of the software and infrastructure, ensuring automatic updates for all users simultaneously. However, customer data remains individually secured and segregated, establishing a high degree of efficiency by running everything on a singular codebase.

NetSuite’s platform is accessible from any device with internet connectivity – be it a laptop, smartphone, or tablet – providing users with secure access via a browser. This ubiquity of access allows decision-makers to keep their finger on the pulse of their business, enabling them to monitor performance and be apprised of any issues from anywhere. Role-based access further enhances security by allowing employees to view only the information pertinent to their roles.

Upon logging in, NetSuite users can access all ERP modules, and the functionality within them, through a single sign-on portal. This consolidates all the essential information and tools needed to manage your business into one centralized location. Additionally, customers have the ability to personalize their home dashboard by using simple drag-and-drop tools, enabling them to select and display the metrics, charts, graphs, reminders, and shortcuts that are most critical to their roles.

Similarly, real-time dashboards throughout the suite can also be customized, ensuring each user’s needs and preferences are catered to optimally.

Tailoring NetSuite to Meet Your Unique Business Needs

NetSuite’s SuiteCloud platform equips customers and partners with the tools to expand the system’s capabilities and adapt it to align with their specific business requirements. This level of flexibility allows businesses to respond to ever-evolving challenges while preventing any concerns of version lock, as all customizations are automatically preserved during platform upgrades.

Here is an overview of SuiteCloud applications and developer tools:

Customizations: The SuiteBuilder tool simplifies the creation of custom fields, forms, records, and roles for developers. This allows companies to adjust the system to mirror their organizational structure and terminology.

Process Automation: SuiteFlow allows developers to create custom workflows for various business processes. By leveraging a user-friendly interface, processes such as lead nurturing and approvals for purchase orders and sales discounts can be automated.

Platform Development: SuiteScript enables developers and NetSuite administrators to devise virtually any new application or process. This is accomplished via JavaScript application scripting, and SuiteScript also offers debugging capabilities for their code.

Integration: SuiteTalk empowers developers to create custom integrations, ensuring seamless data transfer between NetSuite and external software applications via several integration tools.

Application Distribution: SuiteBundler facilitates the bundling of customizations and applications for more efficient deployment, assisting both customers and partners. It simplifies the process of distributing new versions of these applications for partners and applying customizations to various accounts for customers.

Internationalization: Create an intuitive environment for both end-users and administrators irrespective of their local language, currency, or tax and accounting rules, enabling optimal interaction for your global company or offshore subsidiary.

Performance Monitoring: Performance health dashboards offer visibility into system health, helping maintain peak performance and stability of your NetSuite account. This ensures business continuity and keeps users productive by including integrated tools for rapid identification of root causes affecting product experience.”

Tailoring NetSuite to Meet Your Unique Business Needs

NetSuite’s SuiteCloud platform equips customers and partners with the tools to expand the system’s capabilities and adapt it to align with their specific business requirements. This level of flexibility allows businesses to respond to ever-evolving challenges while preventing any concerns of version lock, as all customizations are automatically preserved during platform upgrades.

Here is an overview of SuiteCloud applications and developer tools:

Customizations: The SuiteBuilder tool simplifies the creation of custom fields, forms, records, and roles for developers. This allows companies to adjust the system to mirror their organizational structure and terminology.

Process Automation: SuiteFlow allows developers to create custom workflows for various business processes. By leveraging a user-friendly interface, processes such as lead nurturing and approvals for purchase orders and sales discounts can be automated.

Platform Development: SuiteScript enables developers and NetSuite administrators to devise virtually any new application or process. This is accomplished via JavaScript application scripting, and SuiteScript also offers debugging capabilities for their code.

Integration: SuiteTalk empowers developers to create custom integrations, ensuring seamless data transfer between NetSuite and external software applications via several integration tools.

Application Distribution: SuiteBundler facilitates the bundling of customizations and applications for more efficient deployment, assisting both customers and partners. It simplifies the process of distributing new versions of these applications for partners and applying customizations to various accounts for customers.

Internationalization: Create an intuitive environment for both end-users and administrators irrespective of their local language, currency, or tax and accounting rules, enabling optimal interaction for your global company or offshore subsidiary.

Performance Monitoring: Performance health dashboards offer visibility into system health, helping maintain peak performance and stability of your NetSuite account. This ensures business continuity and keeps users productive by including integrated tools for rapid identification of root causes affecting product experience.

Who Uses NetSuite? A Versatile Solution for Diverse Businesses

As an industry leader in cloud ERP, NetSuite serves a diverse array of businesses, ranging from fledgling startups to renowned enterprises, and from product-based to service-oriented organizations. Its adaptability extends to catering to businesses that cater to other businesses, consumers, or both.

With over 34,000 active customers, NetSuite is utilized across a broad spectrum of industries, including but not limited to:

• Advertising and Digital Marketing
• Apparel, Footwear, and Accessories
• Campus Stores
• Consulting
• Education
• Energy
• Financial Services
• Food and Beverage
• Health and Beauty
• IT Services
• Manufacturing
• Media and Publishing
• Nonprofit
• Professional Services
• Restaurants and Hospitality
• Retail
• Software and Technology
• Transportation and Logistics
• Wholesale Distribution

NetSuite’s versatility doesn’t stop at industry boundaries. Within these diverse companies, it aids employees across various departments and roles, from executive leadership to sales representatives and human resources professionals. Beyond its functional flexibility, NetSuite also boasts impressive global adaptability, supporting more than 190 currencies, 27 languages, and automated tax compliance in over 100 countries.

Streamlining the Implementation Process with NetSuite

Software as a Service (SaaS) ERP systems like NetSuite typically offer swift implementation compared to on-premises solutions, as they bypass the need for server setup or device configuration.

NetSuite enhances this efficiency with its unique SuiteSuccess implementation methodology, a revolutionary approach unavailable from any other software vendor.

Introduced in 2017, SuiteSuccess tailors the implementation process to match each business’s unique characteristics, such as its industry and size. NetSuite currently provides SuiteSuccess editions for twelve verticals: agency, apparel and footwear, food and beverage, IT value-added reseller, manufacturing, media and entertainment, nonprofit, publishing, retail, software, solution provider, and wholesale distribution. Moreover, there are product-specific editions available for financials, planning and budgeting, SuiteCommerce, SuitePeople, and a starter edition targeted at rapidly growing small businesses.

Drawing on over two decades of experience, SuiteSuccess utilizes industry-leading practices to deliver faster deployments and expedite time-to-value. This leads to improved employee adoption rates and increased success for customers. The system comes pre-loaded with Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), reports, dashboards, and reminders, allowing many businesses to launch their NetSuite implementation in 100 days or less.

Despite being designed around established best practices, SuiteSuccess maintains the flexibility to be configured and customized to meet an organization’s specific needs. NetSuite, designed with adaptability at its core, has a team of consultants on standby to assist customers in maximizing the utility of their solution.

Understanding NetSuite’s Pricing Structure

NetSuite operates on a subscription model, with an annual license fee. This fee comprises three primary components: the core platform, optional modules, and the number of users. This structure contrasts with the substantial upfront payment and ongoing maintenance fees required for a perpetual license with on-premises systems.

The core NetSuite platform includes essential features such as accounting, inventory management, order management, and tax management. NetSuite’s modular pricing approach ensures that customers only pay for the functionalities they require, offering a scalable solution as their business expands. This flexibility to activate new modules and add users as needed is a significant advantage of cloud software.

Due to the unique capabilities of each module, license costs can vary. Additionally, a one-time implementation fee applies for the initial setup. For a detailed quotation tailored to your business requirements or to learn more about NetSuite, you’re invited to schedule a free consultation.

NetSuite is a trusted solution chosen by numerous business leaders to manage their critical processes and information. It’s a proven platform that supports all kinds of organizations in achieving their growth objectives. Having all essential business data in a unified system enables more informed decision-making and allows leaders to address issues before they become major disruptions.

In essence, there’s no substitute for gaining insights into your operations and managing your entire organization from a single data source, in one interface.

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