The tag line for this year’s SuiteWorld conference in Las Vegas is ‘Grow beyond.’ What that means, precisely, we will find out in the next few days.
“SuiteWorld is Oracle NetSuite’s annual celebration of customers, business leaders, and partners who run remarkable businesses through the power of the NetSuite platform,” the website proclaims.
“This marks our ninth year of bringing together the NetSuite community and we will be showcasing why our customers grow beyond the expected – and how they have grown to be exceptional leaders in their industry.”
It’s two years, roughly speaking, since I last attended NetSuite’s annual US conference in person, and just under three years since Oracle confirmed it was acquiring the cloud company.
Quite a lot has changed in that time. Although, in speaking to some of the execs pre-conference, in some senses, not much has changed at all… There’s still a laser focus on customer and partner success, in addition to international expansion. Those focus areas were always on the radar for NetSuite before its Oracle parentage.
However, what has become clear is the ability to execute on those plans and turn them from vision to reality not just at pace, but at scale, too. That’s what Oracle brings to the table. Largely hands-off in terms of day-to-day running and look-and-feel, the clout the cloud giant offers has helped transform NetSuite’s ability to realise its potential.
While it would be unbecoming of a cloud company to give too much away before the main event, we can expect the usual slew of updates about NetSuite’s roadmap and what customers can expect going forward. We’re also expecting a big focus on its channel ecosystem if the pre-event announcement is anything to go by.
In particular, the company has unveiled its aims for partners to be as successful as customers are. Akin to its SuiteSuccess customer programme, it hopes to achieve this for partners with its newly announced SuiteLife programme.
At present, NetSuite boasts more than 550 partners across 85 countries. It has ambitious expansion plans so needs a partner programme that is fit for purpose.
“With SuiteLife, new partners will be able to start selling and delivering NetSuite to customers in only 90 days, while existing partners will benefit from innovative new offerings to expand their NetSuite practice and amplify their growth,” the company claims.
“The rate at which customers are moving ERP to the cloud is at an all-time high and our partner ecosystem plays a critical role in helping us meet this demand,” said Craig West, vice president of alliances and channels, Oracle NetSuite.
“By making it easier than ever for partners to join, succeed and grow in the NetSuite ecosystem, we are putting the power of the NetSuite platform into the hands of more organisations across the world. With NetSuite, organisations gain the visibility and control needed to navigate complexities and accelerate growth while NetSuite partners capitalise on the generational transition to the cloud.”
Outside of the partner focus, we’re expecting a raft of customer case studies and the usual celebs talking about how the cloud is helping them do what they do in their given industry and, thus, can help other sectors, too.
Stay tuned for all the news and views coming out of SuiteWorld this week…