This blog post explores current trends in the ERP industry, and how NetSuite Solutions fit into the picture. First, we will dive into the effect that COVID-19 had on the ERP market as a whole now that we've seen businesses go through a full fiscal year in the midst of the pandemic. Next, while COVID-19 temporarily slowed international business, there is still an ever-growing presence of global businesses, and the ERP Industry will play a large part in the scaling and daily operations of enterprises. We are also seeing a trend towards mobility in business, with ERP solutions driving the charge towards always-accessible business data for managers. Additionally, AI & Predictive Analytics are finding a niche in the ERP market, while data security continues to be an area of focus for companies like NetSuite who provide cloud-based ERP solutions.
Impact of COVID-19: Increased Demand for Cloud ERP
Though the pandemic has strained finances for many businesses, the global need for efficiency in the face of a remote workforce has increased the demand for Cloud ERP over the past year. As a result of COVID-19 and it's effect on various industries, in 2021 many businesses are making significant investments in ERP systems in an effort to reduce costs and increase the operational efficiency of a remote workforce, even in the face of the after-effects of 2020 budget cuts and layoffs.
“Businesses are using the cloud effectively to create resilient and disaster-averse systems anywhere across the globe to cater to a remote workforce and protect data and business application integrity as well. […] Thus, the increasingly mobile workforce due to lockdowns, and security to avoid high network downtime costs have fueled the demand for cloud services across the vertical globally.” - Markets and Markets
The result has been an accelerated the shift from on-premises software to cloud-based solutions, which has given the industry a jump-start on the growth that was predicted prior to the pandemic. In fact, 20% of finance executives (key decision makers) expect to spend more on cloud ERP technologies going forward because of the industry changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.
How NetSuite ERP Meets These Needs
While a market-wide increase in demand is a wonderful opportunity for everyone in the ERP industry, NetSuite is in a particularly good position. NetSuite is the #1 Cloud ERP and has the most flexible solutions that can be tailored to meet the unique needs of each business. Since NetSuite is also a highly scalable solution, it can meet the needs of a company from the time it is mid-size businesses to the day it scales to be a global enterprise. The flexibility and complexity of NetSuite comes with an employee learning curve that has historically caused executives to hesitate before implementing NetSuite. However, as more companies shift to cloud-based ERP solutions and increase efficiency in their daily operations, the flexibility provided by NetSuite will be crucial for companies who are looking to break out ahead of the competition. That learning curve for employees to use NetSuite will still be there, but the operational efficiency that companies will gain will be well worth investing some time and money into training employees to use NetSuite.
Global Business Operations: NetSuite OneWorld
Both international trade and global business operations were slowed during the pandemic. However, with boarders opening up and product distribution channels getting back on track, it is clear that global business is as prevalent as ever, and growing. The thing about global businesses is, they require global ERP solutions.
NetSuite OneWorld
While it has already been around for a little while now, NetSuite OneWorld continues to meet the needs of global businesses. This NetSuite Module enables companies to easily manage multiple business units, and streamline subsidiary operations with location-specific capabilities in a single cloud-based ERP platform. The NetSuite OneWorld module includes the tools your team needs to consolidate operations while gaining real-time financial visibility, and can even be used to manage multiple legal entities.
NetSuite OneWorld's comprehensive multi-currency management makes world-wide accounting operations simpler than ever. More specifically, segregated ERP and G/L for each subsidiary combined with consistent processes across countries helps companies more easily manage subsidiaries across the globe. OneWorld even helps your company with compliance for both internal and external processes through audit and compliance reporting capabilities.
Easy access to company data provides managers with insight into business operations in real-time, enabling informed decision making at every level of the business at any time. NetSuite OneWorld also provides businesses with the global CRM and sales support necessary to maintain good growing relationships with customers in any location.
With such a wide-aray of features and capabilities, this NetSuite OneWorld is the perfect solutions for businesses looking to scale internationally, and can even be implemented for enterprises that already operate globally. As global business continues to grow, there will be an ever greater demand for ERP systems that offer these types of global tools.
Mobile ERP: ERP Buddy
Mobile ERP apps are growing in popularity throughout the market because of their user-friendly nature. Mobile ERP interfaces can enable users to enter or view important data at any time. This means that employees can quickly and easily do things like add potential sales leads directly into the ERP system even when away from a computer. With a significant increase in the number of remote workers over the past year, many of whom are remaining remote post-pandemic, mobile ERP applications can be expected to play a much bigger part in ERP management over the next few years.
ERP Buddy for NetSuite
Though not created by NetSuite, ERP Buddy is a CRM application created specifically for NetSuite ERP. This mobile app changes the way companies use NetSuite by enabling employees to easily access CRM and transaction records via voice commands. Keeping data updated is a key component to leveraging the power of Oracle NetSuite ERP. ERP Buddy helps employees more easily enter the data they are responsible for, making NetSuite more convenient to use.
ERP Buddy is a great solutions for companies with sales employees who travel frequently and struggle to adopt NetSuite into their day. ERP Buddy gives these employees instant access to sales data in office and on the go, which means they can enter new CRM data at any time. Employees can find and access records with the push of a button or a voice command. From sending emails and messages instantly, to adding notes directly to CRM records, ERP Buddy helps companies maintain good customer relations and keep better records.
Since ERP Buddy uses existing NetSuite user access, company user roles and permissions will remain the same. This makes ERP Buddy the perfect solution for companies that are looking to organize thier channels easier and more quickly view transactions without any added hassle related to application management.
As the demand for mobile ERP applications increases, ERP solutions like NetSuite which allow 3rd party developers to create applications that can be plugged directly into the existing ERP coding framework are in a position to see rapid innovation.
AI & Predictive Analytics: NetSuite Dashboards & Integrations
In the modern business world, companies are putting an ever-growing focus on delivering the most personalized experiences possible to customers. In order to do this, companies need ERP systems that can accommodate that level of personalization through features like highly customizable dashboards and predictive analytics, which are achieved using AI.
NetSuite Dashboards & Integrations
A key feature of NetSuite Modules are the customizable dashboards and data analytics that enable company-wide visibility of business operation data and KPIs. In addition to the built-in AI & predictive analytics features of NetSuite ERP, there are many intgerations that can connect NetSuite ERP with other business management applications that also make use of these tools.
For example, a NetSuite Integration with Mailchimp allows businesses to make use of the wide away of AI driven tools within Mailchimp's all-in-one marketing platform. Though Mialchimp is known for primarily for it's in-depth email marketing tools, there are many other marketing capabilities included in the application from postcard mailing to ad management. By integrating NetSuite with Mailchimp, businesses can take advantage of tools like ecommerce automation including cart abandonment and product recommendations.
From growing your audience to fine-tuning retargeting campaigns, the combined power of NetSuite and Mailchimp AI & predictive analytics help managers more quickly find the best marketing tactics. Companies can even ebmed Mailchimp forms on their websites that sync back to NetSuite, which means that all company data is still accessible inside of NetSuite, while making the most of Mailchimp's robust marketing framework.
As AI & predictive analytics continue to play a bigger role in guiding business decisions, ERP features like NetSuite's KPI dashboards combined with the power of predictive applications like Mailchimp will continue to help business managers identify trends and quickly respond with operational decisions that will put them ahead-of the competition.
Centralized Data & Data Security: NetSuite Data Centers
Centralized data is a key aspect of all ERP systems. It eliminates conflicting data within various departments, and helps business managers make decisions more quickly. Housing company data in one space also simplifies the various data security measures that need to be in place. With on-premise ERP solutions, companies have to put a lot of time and money into ensuring data security. However, cloud-based ERP solutions shift much of that responsibility over to the people who manage the cloud datacenters. After all, data saved in the cloud doesn’t just float around in space, it has to be housed somewhere. There are already great efforts to protect this data, but as technology continues to change, cloud ERP providers will need to be ahead of the curve when it comes to data security.
This is Where NetSuite Data Center Comes In
NetSuite DataCenter provides your organization with the tools you need to effectively and securely manage your data, as well as operational support from a world-class hosting operations team. NetSuite Data Center has a scalable application architecture, include performance monitoring tools, and regularly undergo data center performance audits. The module includes a range of reliable enterprise-class data management features, and is designed around redundancy to provide disaster recovery and failover capabilities.
The module includes application security through encryption, IP address restrictions, role level access, and idle disconnect. On the other hand, operational security is achieved through continuous monitoring, separation of duties, as well as security/privacy certifications, and physical access rules. By simply utilizing these security measures already in place within NetSuite Data Center, businesses that use NetSuite ERP don't have to spend as much time and money building up similar security measures of their own to protect thier data.
Conclusion
In general, there is a trend of increasing demand across all areas of the ERP Industry. In particular we are seeing greater trends towards cloud ERP systems, global business capabilities within ERP, mobile ERP applications, AI & predictive analytics, as well as centralized data and data security. Oracle NetSuite is in a great position to meet these needs within the ERP industry. Between the innovations by NetSuite themselves, as well as NetSuite's greater community of partners, consultants and developers, NetSuite ERP can be expected to remain a primary player in the ERP market as the #1 Cloud-based ERP Software.
Published July 1 , 2021
Hopefully, this post gives you something to work with while trying to understand NetSuite and what it can do for your business. If you have any questions and want some consulting advice, feel free to contact our team at Anchor Group.