Fresh Produce Group Wins NetSuite 'Hairball Award' for Greatest Cost Reduction

SYDNEY, May 25 /PRNewswire/ -- The Fresh Produce Group (FPG), one of Australia's largest and most innovative fresh produce providers, has won the NetSuite Hairball Award in the Greatest Cost Reduction category from NetSuite Inc. (NYSE: N),  a leading vendor of cloud computing business management software suites. The Hairball Awards recognise businesses that have used cloud computing technology to disentangle their organisations from a complex, disparate hairball of conventional, on-site business software, generating major cost savings and productivity gains.

The Fresh Produce Group (FPG) had a tangle of applications which meant it had little real-time insight into business performance and lacked control over the business and profitability. With NetSuite, FPG:

• Eliminated an obsolete DOS financial system and numerous spreadsheets
• Improved net profit margins by 100% within 18 months of the NetSuite deployment
• Saved $1 million per year by identifying and reducing overhead

In accepting the award, Leon Condon, Director of FPG, said: "In the first 18 months of our cloud implementation alone, we saw a 100% improvement in our net profit margin. It has also helped identify and eliminate overhead expenses, which is saving us approximately $1 million per annum.  In addition to satisfying our desire to minimise fixed technology overhead costs, NetSuite has successfully offered us compelling value that has enabled us to quickly and cost-effectively respond to our ever-growing market demand."

Critical to FPG is having real-time visibility over all attributes of its perishable stock lines. Leon Condon said: "We were looking for control, leading to improved profitability. We had to become a technologically advanced business."

NetSuite replaced multiple software systems including a DOS-based financial system and Excel spreadsheets which were used to compile forecasting and inventory.

"It's a real accolade to know that the successes we've achieved in partnership with NetSuite are seen as significant in the global perspective," Leon Condon said.

NetSuite's Managing Director for APAC, Chris Schafer said: "The Hairball Awards are a light-hearted approach to a very serious problem facing businesses of all sizes today. Organisations around the world are painfully gagging on their inefficient, tangled mass of complex, expensive enterprise software systems. We recognise those who have coughed up their biggest on-premise software hairballs and are now reaping the benefits of cloud computing business management suites.

"The winners distinguished themselves by capitalising heavily on the potential of the NetSuite solution to replace numerous applications and streamline core aspects of enterprise operations."

About the Hairball Awards

The "Hairballs" are a new customer award program recognising businesses that have achieved major cost savings and productivity gains with the aid of cloud computing. By moving to the cloud, these companies have been able to disentangle their organisations from a complex, disparate cluster of conventional, on-premise software—or as NetSuite would call it, "the hairball of applications and middleware that hinders productivity and drives up costs due to brittle integration, incompatible processes, low productivity and high maintenance costs."

For the complete list of winners, please visit www.netsuite.com/winners.

Nominees for the Hairball Awards were chosen from among thousands of NetSuite's customers who have found success and created value by increasing the efficiency of their operating practices with the NetSuite solution. They demonstrate the strong economic case for a professionally managed, tightly integrated enterprise software platform, which eliminates the complexity and restrictions of multiple software products.

About Fresh Produce Group

With offices in Australia and Asia, and a network that spans from farms in California to restaurants in Sydney and supermarkets in Thailand, the Fresh Produce Group grows, sources and distributes quality fresh produce worldwide.

Fresh Produce Group includes 5 key divisions: Imports, Exports, Domestic, Wholesale and Services.

Visit: www.freshproducegroup.com.

About NetSuite

NetSuite Inc. (NYSE: N) is a leading vendor of cloud computing integrated business management software suites for mid-market enterprises and divisions of large companies. NetSuite enables mid-market companies to manage core business operations in a single system, which includes accounting / enterprise resource planning (ERP), customer relationship management (CRM), and Ecommerce. NetSuite's patent-pending "real-time dashboard" technology provides an easy-to-use view into up-to-date, role-specific business information.

For more information about NetSuite please visit www.netsuite.com.au.  

NOTE: NetSuite and the NetSuite logo are registered service marks of NetSuite Inc.  

SOURCE Fresh Produce