“Our focus has changed and we have sharpened it to help businesses navigate through challenges of the supply chain. A lot of work has been done in warehouse management as well, which includes inventory count, innovations, mobility strategy as well as management control. The NetSuite features are built on intelligence that helps customers manage inventory and supply chain better,” he said.
NetSuite boasts of a suite of cloud-based financials/enterprise resource planning (ERP) as well as omnichannel commerce software that runs the business of over 32,000 customers in 217 countries.
The company announced a number of product innovations at the conference, held in Las Vegas in September, that could help businesses tackle the challenges at play. Among the announcements were a workforce management solution to help organisations optimise their staffing needs as well as help businesses manage labour costs and profitability. Besides this, it also released NetSuite Ship Central to help businesses improve the efficiency of warehouse operations. The application claims to equip warehouse workers with packing and shipping capabilities on a mobile or kiosk device.
Talking about how the pandemic was a “perfect storm” for cloud companies like them, Chisham said they saw a greater update in usage of the system. “It increased dramatically – at least 25%-30% on some of the features developed for international customers. A lot of organisations thought they needed to have a contingency plan in place. There was more visibility of the system as everyone was working from home. It ended up being a real positive for us as we saw a different usage pattern and customers were trying to get the most out of the system,” he said.
Speaking about the India market, he stated that it was seeing a rapid change of pace. “It is a complex and growing market. We have a services-based approach in the India market. There is a great opportunity in services and that is what looks like a key area for us in the longer term. We have a great footprint in India, particularly with subsidiaries.”
The buyer in India, Chisham added, is sophisticated and knows what they want. “It is a knowledgeable market and our approach continues to be to look at those customers that fit our profile,” he said.On the subject of small businesses and its importance for the company, he said NetSuite continues to play well when those businesses grow to a sufficient size. “Typically, we have seen that if such businesses start to trade internationally or have an organic growth, then the systems in use are just not sufficient. So it really is dependent on the business and the customer itself. We bring tremendous benefit if a company is on a growth trajectory,” he added.
Chisham said new markets have been opening up and they are assessing things carefully. “We have seen some of the adjacent markets such as Vietnam and Indonesia open up as well. We want to focus on key business process areas that can help companies grow. This is important right now especially in the aftermath of the challenging situations that businesses are facing,” he added.
(Disclaimer- The reporter was on an Oracle sponsored trip to Las Vegas)
