NetSuite aims for the next billion dollar revenue

SAN JOSE, California — The biggest announcement in this year’s SuiteWorld is probably the statement of NetSuite Chief Executive Zach Nelson saying that after 18 years, the company he leads is set to become a Billion-dollar company in 2016.

With a vision to deliver enterprise-grade services via the cloud, Nelson attributes most of company’s success to the efforts of its employees worldwide, together with the companies, subsidiaries, and organizations that use its products as expressed in his keynote to delegates on the first day.

“Every type of company in the world is using Netsuite…and we’re very excited about that,” said Nelson. “The cloud has completely won. And my argument is, that is has won in every industry and will continue to win in every industry.”

Early this year, Netsuite was ranked as the No. 1 Cloud ERP vendor by research firm Gartner, and with a market share growing 45% in 2015, compared to its closest competitors having only single digit growth, except for Microsoft with 10.6 percent. Still, far from what the San Mateo-based ERP company achieved.

“Clearly (NetSuite) is the most widely used business system in the cloud in the world today.” said Nelson as he continue his keynote. “We will hit a billion dollar revenue this year.”

New products

At this year’s SuiteWorld, which happened at the San Jose Convention Center, one of the major announcements was SuiteBilling, a new product that recognizes the complex processes from order to billing to revenue recognition all within one system since it’s built natively into NetSuite’s core ERP system.

Another announcement was the release of a host of new product enhancements to NetSuite OneWorld, a cloud-based ERP system designed for enterprises to meet complex industry, regulatory and tax requirements at global scale. With OneWorld 16, the new release “further helps global companies increase operational efficiency, streamline financial reporting, deepen local and global compliance, localize business processes and deliver peace of mind for CFOs, controllers and finance users”.

“The robust functionality and flexibility of NetSuite OneWorld makes it the last ERP system you’ll ever need,” said Zach Nelson, NetSuite chief executive. “Whether they’re a fast-growing start-up or a multinational enterprise, NetSuite continues to meet customer demands with features that enable them to confidently expand into new markets, launch new products or services and adapt to customer and market demands with a unified and agile cloud-based platform.”

Further, Netsuite added new capabilities on the company’s Order Management application, which they said is one of the most widely used cloud-based, order management solutions in the world. With Intelligent Order Management, Netsuite provided intelligent omnichannel order allocation so merchants can automate how to best fulfill orders based on their inventory availability and the configurable business rules they establish inside the ERP system.

‘Most widely used business system’

When Nelson proclaimed that “every type of company in the world is using Netsuite…(and it’s the) most widely used business system in the cloud today”, the company co-founder’s pronouncement holds water.

Companies such as Boston Globe Media Partners, the parent company of Boston Globe; Specialty Bakery, a leading supplier of frozen bakery goods; Sanitary Care Products Asia (Sanicare), a manufacturer of home and facial paper products in the Philippines; that URBAN626, manufacturer of the URB-E compact electric vehicle; Lingerie Company of Australia, a leading luxury lingerie wholesaler and retailer who represents Simone Pérèle and Implicite brands; specialist professional recruitment company PageGroup; finance company SoFi, and Blue Yonder, a leading predictive applications company based in Germany, to name a few, are all NetSuite customers. A variety of companies catering to different markets, globally.

 And there seems to be no stopping in terms of diversity.

Only recently, the Japanese subsidiary, NetSuite Co., Ltd., added HobbyLink Japan Inc. to the company’s growing roster. HobbyLink is a distributor of Japanese toys and hobby products to consumers and retail businesses across the globe. The popular online source for anything anime has selected NetSuite OneWorld to support its global expansion plans.

Since its establishment in 1995, HobbyLink Japan, supplies some of the world’s finest hobby kits, figures and toys, to the delight of anime fans all over the world. The online e-commerce website includes a comprehensive selection of Gundam, Sci-Fi, anime and military models, books and supplies from a 4,000-square-meter facility in Tochigi.

For 20 years the toy distributor enjoyed business growth but experienced challenges with its existing on-premise accounting system and numerous spreadsheets that created extensive manual work and were prone to error. The company said that the old system required heavy customization and could only offer basic reporting capabilities. It added that employees had to hand code most of the customer queries and responses, which eventually hampered the company’s ability to manage growth.

“With NetSuite OneWorld, we expect to have clear insights into the business and business performance and I believe that there will be significant productivity improvements as the system will allow us to get near-instant access to business critical information,” said HobbyLink Chief Executive Scott Hards. We believe with NetSuite, we will be able to effectively manage our inventory to keep our stock levels and types at a point where we can execute well on demand and our customer service department can give the most up-to-date information to our customers. HobbyLink’s aim is to continue to supply the world’s finest hobby products and toys to its customers and provide an exceptional customer experience. “

HobbyLink Japan has a catalogue of 125,000 SKUs and actual inventory of 60,000 items that can be ordered online and shipped to customers and collectors around the world with large markets in the US, Australia, the UK, Canada, Spain, Italy, Brazil, Germany, Malaysia and the Philippines. Currently, 30 percent of its sales go through hobby shops and the other 70 percent through the ecommerce site.

“HobbyLink joins the growing number of businesses that see the value of bringing their mission-critical data together in NetSuite,” said Tomoyuki Nakanishi, vice president and general manager Japan for NetSuite. “With the flexibility, agility and scalability of NetSuite’s cloud ERP, these businesses can continue to grow and profit.”

source: interaksyon.com

More than 1 billion Android devices to ship in 2014: Gartner

LONDON — The number of smartphones and tablet computers shipped with Google’s Android operating system will break the 1 billion barrier this year, research group Gartner said on Tuesday.

Android, which is installed on products made by Samsung, HTC, Sony and many other manufacturers, is forecast to reach 1.1 billion users in 2014, up 26 percent on last year, with the strongest demand in emerging markets.

Apple’s iOS and Mac OS operating systems are expected to be in 344 million new iPhones, iPads and Macs this year, Gartner added, representing a 28 percent jump on the number of devices shipped in 2013.

“There is no doubt that there is a volume-versus-value equation, with Android users purchasing lower-cost devices compared to Apple users,” Gartner analyst Annette Zimmerman said in a statement on Tuesday.

Microsoft’s Windows operating system, which dominates the PC and notebook segments, is forecast to be in 360 million new devices, up from 328 million in 2013.

Growth in the PC and notebook segment has been hit by the popularity of tablet computers, sales of which are forecast to increase by 47 percent this year to 263 million, according to Gartner.

“Users continue to move away from the traditional PC as it becomes more of a shared-content creation tool, while the greater flexibility of tablets, hybrids and lighter notebooks address users’ increasingly different usage demands,” Gartner research director Ranjit Atwal said.

Sales of mobile phones are expected to continue to increase, but at a slower pace, with the focus moving away from top-end premium devices to mid-level products, he added.

Gartner said it expects combined global shipments of all devices to reach 2.48 billion units this year, up 7.6 per cent on 2013.

source: interaksyon.com

Lenovo tops PC makers

Lenovo Group held on to its position as the world’s No. 1 personal computer maker in the latest quarter despite a drastic dip in its core Chinese market, according to figures published by tech research firm Gartner on Wednesday.

Overall, the latest numbers showed an 8.6 percent decline in PC sales in the third quarter, confirming a worldwide trend towards tablets that has benefited Apple Inc and Google Inc but hurt traditional PC stalwarts Microsoft Corp and Intel Corp.

Worldwide PC shipments totaled 80.3 million in the latest three month period, the lowest level since 2008, Gartner said, despite the ‘back to school’ season when sales traditionally spike.

Europe, Middle East and Africa was the worst hit region, with a 13.7 percent decline in PC sales, followed by Asia Pacific with an 11.2 percent decline. The U.S. market increased 3.5 percent, helped by low inventories being re-stocked and the popularity of models featuring the latest Intel chips, Gartner said.

“Consumers’ shift from PCs to tablets for daily content consumption continued to decrease the installed base of PCs both in mature as well as in emerging markets,” said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner. “A greater availability of inexpensive Android tablets attracted first-time consumers in emerging markets, and as supplementary devices in mature markets.”

Strong sales in the United States and Europe helped Chinese PC maker Lenovo hold onto the top spot among manufacturers, offsetting the decline in Asia.

Lenovo’s overall shipments rose 2.8 percent over a year ago to give the company a 17.6 percent share of the global market.

Former No. 1 Hewlett-Packard Co, which is being remodeled by Chief Executive Meg Whitman, posted a 1.5 percent growth in shipments for a 17.1 percent global market share. It was H-P’s first positive shipment growth figure since the first quarter of 2012. Whitman said on Wednesday that she expected to stabilize revenues next year as she continues her work to reverse the company’s fortunes.

source: interaksyon.com

Over a hundred billion apps will be downloaded from app stores in 2013 — Gartner

MANILA, Philippines — The mobile ‘app’ ecosystem will see strong growth in 2013 as research firm Gartner predicts that more than 100 billion apps will be downloaded from various app stores this year, up 60 percent from last year’s figures.

Majority of these apps will be free, the Gartner report said, but paid downloads will also see a surge this year as 9 billion paid apps will be installed on modern smartphones by the end of 2013.

“Free apps currently account for about 60 percent and 80 percent of the total available apps in Apple’s App Store and Google Play, respectively,” said Brian Blau, research director at Gartner. “iOS and Android app stores combined are forecast to account for 90 percent of global downloads in 2017. These app stores are still increasingly active due to richer ecosystems and large and very active developer communities.

Both Apple’s App Store and Google’s Play Store celebrated 50 billion downloads from their respective mobile storefronts this year, with Apple reporting as much as 800 apps being installed on iOS devices every second.

Android currently holds a majority share of the market with three in four smartphones around the world bearing Google’s mobile operating system. Apple, on the other hand, as a 13.2-percent share of the smartphone pie.

Other app stores available today include Amazon’s app store, BlackBerry World, and the Microsoft Windows Phone Store, all of which have marginal shares in the overall app store market.

Gartner said they see no signs of app movement slowing down in the next few years, but will see a gradual tapering of growth by 2017.

“We expect average monthly downloads per iOS device to decline from 4.9 in 2013 to 3.9 in 2017, while average monthly downloads per Android device will decline from 6.2 in 2013 to 5.8 in 2017. This relates back to the overall trend of users using the same apps more often rather than downloading new ones,” the research firm explained.

Despite this, revenues from these app downloads will still see marked increase in the coming years, with in-app purchases seeing a jump from 17 percent of the total $26 billion in 2013 to as high as 48 percent after four years.

Research shows that IAP contributes to a significant amount of Apple’s App Store revenue from iPhones worldwide. Other platforms have not reached such high levels as the iPhone, but analysts expect they will also see IAP contributions increase in the future.

“We see that users are not put off by the fact that they have already paid for an app, and are willing to spend more if they are happy with the experience,” Blau added. “As a result, we believe that IAP is a promising and sustainable monetization method because it encourages performance-based purchasing; that is, users only pay when they are happy with the experience, and developers have to work hard to earn the revenue through good design and performance.”

source: interaksyon.com

Smart watches gain interest and popularity

PALO ALTO, California (AP) — On a sunny day at a picnic table in Silicon Valley, Eric Migicovsky glanced down at his wristwatch. He wasn't checking the time, he was checking his email. Glancing up, he grinned. The message was from yet another journalist.

In this corner of a world obsessed with the latest tech gadget, Migicovsky is this week's hotshot as his start-up company rolls out its new, high-tech Pebble smart watches. The $150, postage stamp-sized computer on a band is tethered wirelessly to a wearer's Android or iPhone.

With hands truly free, wearers can also read texts, see who is calling them, scan Twitter or Facebook feeds and yes, check the time, while digging in their garden, barbequing a steak or — as he was doing when he conceived of the idea — riding a bike when his phone began to ring.

And that's just the first version. Apps are being developed that could eventually bring everything from Angry Birds to eBay bidding onto our wrists.

"I like it when I'm running," says Migicovsky, "I like it on the subway, on an airplane, anytime I want to see what's on my phone without pulling it out of my pocket."

Pebble, which began shipping in January, is not the first to make a play for the watch market, which dwindled when consumers added smartphones to their purses and pockets. But this little firm of 11 is the most popular in the smart watch sector today, bubbling up amid rampant rumors that Apple has its own iWatch in the works.


Apple spokeswoman Natalie Harrison declined to comment, but it wasn't the first time she'd been asked. Apple has several patents for high-tech watches.

Tim Bajarin, a Creative Strategies analyst who's followed Apple for more than three decades, said he's been waiting for an iWatch ever since the company introduced a tiny Nano in 2010 and consumers began strapping them to their wrists.

"I do believe that Apple could potentially disrupt the watch market if they took their innovative design and tied it to their smartphones and ecosystems," he said. "We have no knowledge that they are doing this, but the area is ripe for innovation."

Meanwhile, Bajarin has one of the first 6,000 Pebbles shipped out so far, and he was gushing over it.

"I love it," he said. "I have four or five people who message me consistently, mostly my wife. In the past, I was always being forced to look at the face of my smartphone to see who it was, now I just glance at my wrist."

The next step? He wants a "Dick Tracy watch" that he could verbally order around, instead of pushing buttons.

Even without Apple, Pebble already faces serious competition with a handful of other smart watches.

The Cookoo, selling for $130, has a battery that lasts a year, compared to Pebble's once-a-week charge. The Sony SmartWatch, at $129.98, has a touchscreen, Motorola's $149 MOTOACTV includes a heart rate monitor and MetaWatch's $299 STRATA has a more feminine design.

These newly emerging devices are innovative not only for what they do, but also for how they were funded.

Last April, after failing to convince venture capitalists to fund Pebble, Migicovsky pitched it on Kickstarter, a website where any Internet user can support a project. He asked for $100,000. He got $10.3 million before capping his request. Supporters who spent $115 were promised a watch, which means Pebble has already sold about 85,000 watches. Cookoo and STRATA also turned to Kickstarter for start-up funding.

Michael Gartenberg, research director for technology research firm Gartner Inc., warned all of these start-ups face major challenges.

"There's been a lot of failed efforts to create smart watches and the key will be for vendors to understand the watch isn't just another digital device," he said. "Consumers wear watches for many reasons that have nothing to do with telling time, as evidenced by watch companies such as Rolex."

Gartenberg said that so far, none of the smart watches are really designed for the mass market. "The real question is will Apple or Google get into this space?" he asked, noting that Microsoft tried some years ago with their failed SPOT watches.

Any new device, even a watch, also raises regulatory questions. Are they safe to use on airplanes? Could they interfere with other devices? California Highway Patrol spokeswoman Erin Komatsubara said drivers are allowed to glance at a smart watch but it's not recommended to try to read anything at all while driving.

"It's considered a distraction," she said. "Two eyes on the road, two hands on the wheel, that's what we really, really want."

Manuel Yazijian, president of The American Watchmakers-Clockmakers Institute, said mechanical watches have a mystique of their own. But he said watchmakers may eventually turn their focus, attention to detail and ability to work on small items to smart watches.

"It's a different ballgame. I just don't know if they'll need maintenance and repair yet," he said. "Time will tell, no pun intended."

And the app Yazijian would like to see? "Our industry likes the old school mechanical stuff that ticks, like a heartbeat, like a live animal on your wrist," he said. "It would be so cool if the smart watch could make a ticking sound, right?"

source: philstar.com

Facebook to showcase new look for newsfeed on March 7

SAN FRANCISCO — Facebook Inc will unveil a new look for its popular “newsfeed” next week, the latest move by the Web company to revamp key elements of its 1 billion member social network.

Facebook will showcase the newsfeed makeover at a media event on March 7 at its Menlo Park, California headquarters, the company said in an emailed invitation to reporters on Friday.

The event will be Facebook’s second high-profile product event this year, following the rollout of its social search feature in January.

Facebook’s newsfeed, which displays an ever-changing stream of the photos, videos and comments uploaded from a user’s network of friends, is one of the three “pillars” of the service, along with search and user profiles, Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg has said.

The last major update to Facebook’s newsfeed was in September 2011. Since then, the company has incorporated ads directly into the feed and the company has shifted its focus to creating “mobile first experiences,” as more people now access the social network every day on mobile devices than on desktop PCs.

The mobile version of Facebook still lacks many of the features available on the PC version, said Brian Blau, an analyst with industry research firm Gartner. “So maybe this is a way to bring some of that together,” he said.

source: interaksyon.com