NetSuite Reinvents the User Experience for Business Applications

SAN JOSE, Calif., May 13, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- NETSUITE SUITEWORLD 2014 -- NetSuite Inc. (NYSE: N), the industry's leading provider of cloud-based financials / ERP and omnichannel commerce software suites, today announced a next-generation user interface that extends its leadership and innovation in creating business management software suites in the cloud. NetSuite's new user interface (UI) makes it faster and easier than ever before to interact with information and allows users to enjoy a more intuitive and visually engaging work experience. The new UI continues to deliver a seamless and consistent experience for users of NetSuite's unified, cloud business management platform and breaks down the usability barriers inherent in disparate departmental applications, which require users to switch from application to application to try to automate business processes.

As the pioneer in cloud ERP, NetSuite has led the revolution in user interface design for modern business applications. Its first release abandoned the Microsoft Windows desktop metaphor of the era and moved applications into the world of the web. NetSuite pioneered new user interface technologies that revolutionized the capabilities of business applications and set the standards that are still being copied today: From pioneering in-line editing in web-based applications; to incorporating Ajax technologies to create business intelligence "dashboards" that live natively in core business applications; to inventing the concept of "role-based" user interfaces. 

In once again reinventing the business application user interface, NetSuite conducted three years of deep usability research with its customers. As a true business management system, NetSuite's innovation in user experience design is quite different from applications in most business departments, which are designed to support the needs of only one role. NetSuite deployments support users from all departments of a company – from front-line sales, marketing, finance, ecommerce, HR and services employees through to C-level executives.  NetSuite completed extensive research, user observations, and usability testing with users across all of these roles.  The result is a consistent, seamless experience that allows business users to work faster and easier and get the job done more efficiently. For example, sales professionals can more quickly and easily enter and track information on their customers and prospects, finance personnel can easily find the data necessary to close the books, services professionals get rapid insight into project status and profitability and the CEO gets a comprehensive view of company operations with the interactive, real-time dashboard.

NetSuite plans to roll out the new UI with NetSuite's 2014.2 release, scheduled for Q3 2014.

NetSuite CEO Zach Nelson unveiled the new NetSuite UI today during a keynote address at SuiteWorld 2014. Founder and CTO Evan Goldberg will discuss and demonstrate the new capabilities more deeply in his SuiteWorld 2014 keynote tomorrow.

"Since the day I founded NetSuite I have spent much of my time tackling one of the thorniest challenges in building complex mission-critical business applications  -- making them not only easy-to-use, but also enjoyable," said Goldberg,  "Our new UI was not only designed with customers in mind, in some ways it was actually designed by customers. The result is an experience that really sets the standard for modern business applications."

Leveraging and supporting HTML5 and based on principles of modern "flat design," which emphasizes crispness and clarity, the NetSuite UI blends elegance and functionality with easy-to-read fonts, attractively redesigned icons and graphics, increased whitespace and greater aesthetic simplicity while enhancing the rich features that help distinguish the world's leading cloud business management software suite, Overall highlights include:

• Completely new visual design across all elements of the suite.
• A slim, anchored navigational header that ensures quick and easy access to navigation and tools such as Global Search, Recent Records, Help, Quick Add, and Shortcuts.
• A new global QuickAdd that enables users to rapidly add tasks, events, contacts, and more from anywhere in the product.
• "Progressive disclosure" that conceals action prompts until mouseover for a cleaner experience.
• An improved experience on tablets through a responsive dashboard, larger menus and controls and improved scrolling.
• A new dashboard personalization panel that makes it easier for users to tailor the dashboard to their individual needs.
• New iconography focused on learnability; greater visual consistency across all pages, pop-ups and other interface elements.

Hour-long webinars on June 16 and 17 will offer users a look at NetSuite's bold new UI and provide guidance on making the most of the updated environment. For further information and registration, please click here.

Dashboards

• Improved dashboard portlet layouts, presentation and alignment of data, and responsive to suit the device used.
• Improved look and feel and usability of dashboard personalization tools.
• Progressive disclosure of icons and actions to reduce clutter and redundancy, allowing greater focus on what's important.
• Improved drag-and-drop capability for easier and intuitive personalization of dashboard content.
• Improved presentation and layout of portlet filtering options.

Record Pages

• Icon in the header to help tie icons used in recent records, history and portlets to the actual record types.
• Improved information hierarchy and visual hierarchy of record pages, with better sizing, spacing and alignment of elements.
• Improved look, feel and interactivity of record page controls.
• Additional states, focus, mouseover and helper icons on hover.
• Improved legibility and spacing on record pages; labels above the fields for minimal horizontal scrolling.
• Improved table design with less horizontal page scrolling.

List Pages

• Redesigned List and Search result pages focusing on usability (filters moved to the top, progressive disclosure of filters, better use of space, row highlighting).

Today, more than 20,000 companies and subsidiaries depend on NetSuite to run complex, mission-critical business processes globally in the cloud. Since its inception in 1998, NetSuite has established itself as the leading provider of enterprise-class cloud financials/ERP suites for divisions of large enterprises and mid-sized organizations seeking to upgrade their antiquated client/server ERP systems. NetSuite excels at streamlining business operations as demonstrated in a recent Gartner study naming NetSuite as the fastest growing financial management software vendor on a global basis. NetSuite continues its success in delivering the best cloud ERP/financials suites to businesses around the world, enabling them to lower IT costs significantly while increasing productivity, as the global adoption of the cloud is accelerating.

Follow NetSuite's Cloud blog, NetSuite's Facebook page and @NetSuite Twitter handle for real-time updates.

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

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

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SOURCE NetSuite Inc.