NetSuite's New Cloud Platform First to Deliver Economic, Productivity and Innovation Promise of Cloud Computing

SAN FRANCISCO, April 15 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- NetSuite SuiteCloud 2010 -- NetSuite Inc. (NYSE: N), a leading vendor of cloud computing business management software suites, today announced the immediate availability of SuiteCloud 2.0, the newest version of the world's leading cloud development platform for building and deploying powerful cloud business applications. SuiteCloud 2.0's cutting-edge capabilities enable enterprises to take full advantage of the significant economic, productivity and innovation benefits of cloud computing, including multi-tenant, always-on SaaS infrastructure and scalable, tightly integrated applications for Accounting/ERP, CRM and Ecommerce. SuiteCloud 2.0 offers a wide range of development tools, services and third-party software designed to help customers, independent software vendors (ISVs) and channel businesses meet ever-changing business process needs across a range of industries.

SuiteCloud 2.0 leverages NetSuite's powerful, tightly integrated technology stack to deliver a number of new industry-leading features that make it the most flexible and cost-effective cloud application development platform available. New features include the first solution for true application management in the cloud, seamless cloud-to-cloud integration with single sign-on authentication and new graphical workflow management software that for the first time gives users the ability to quickly point and click to create and alter custom workflows to support the way businesses need to work in real-time. With SuiteCloud, NetSuite's customers, developers and channel partners have at their disposal a powerful platform to transform static businesses into real-time enterprises with the ability to monitor, analyze and alter key operating processes to address changing challenges and opportunities. For more information about the NetSuite cloud computing platform, please visit www.netsuite.com/suitecloud.

SuiteCloud 2.0 was formally unveiled today at SuiteCloud 2010, NetSuite's annual partner and developer conference being held in San Francisco. This year's conference is being attended by hundreds of channel businesses and ISVs, including Amazon Web Services and Google, who have come together to learn how the NetSuite cloud ecosystem is powering lucrative new business models for resellers and accelerating development of some of the industry's most sophisticated business cloud applications.

"The advances in SuiteCloud 2.0 create substantial competitive advantages for ISVs and developers looking to embrace cloud computing and expand their practices into new verticals," said Mike Fauscette, Group Vice President, Software Business Solutions, Integration, Development and Application Strategies at IDC. "No other cloud computing platform offers the breadth of enterprise functionality that NetSuite delivers, making it an ideal choice for complex business processes."

"These innovations effectively put to rest any remaining misconceptions about the emerging dominating power of the cloud," said NetSuite CEO Zach Nelson. "Since its inception, cloud computing has proven to be disruptive and transformative, beginning with its impact on IT cost reduction and continuing with its ability to help companies focus on building and improving the core processes that really move the needle on productivity. SuiteCloud's new capabilities for cloud-to-cloud integration, graphical application customization and application management mark the cloud's ability to transform how companies innovate."

Developer Innovation in the Cloud

NetSuite has a long heritage of providing customers with the ability to configure and customize the NetSuite business management suite. Early breakthroughs in flexibility included such innovations as custom records for extending the database schema and a unique and powerful scripting language for custom cloud programming. These cloud customization capabilities coalesced last year in the form of the rich SuiteCloud development platform, representing more than a decade of pioneering development work. SuiteCloud enables developers and ISVs to build deep vertical business suites and add commercial extensions to NetSuite. In just one year, the SuiteCloud platform has attracted thousands of developers and boasts hundreds of new vertical applications. SuiteCloud 2.0 incorporates the following new ground-breaking features:

• True Application Management in the Cloud – For years, NetSuite has leveraged the cloud to make regular upgrades and maintenance to core functionality painless and transparent. The same enhanced deployment and upgrade tools used by NetSuite are now available to third-party developers and ISVs in SuiteCloud 2.0. This capability immediately frees developers from the hassles of version maintenance and customization blind alleys and ensures that customers enjoy access to the latest and greatest capabilities available, without additional integration or re-implementation costs. SuiteCloud 2.0 also includes the ability to implement phased rollouts, an industry best practice.
• Cloud-to-Cloud Integration with Single Sign-On Authentication – It is a common misconception that cloud-based applications are difficult to integrate, creating islands of functionality. SuiteCloud 2.0 destroys this myth by demonstrating the full potential of connected cloud applications. The SuiteCloud platform includes the ability to securely integrate with and pass login credentials from NetSuite to other cloud applications, or to on-premise applications using the SuiteSignOn capabilities of SuiteCloud Web Services, which is based on the popular SOAP standard. Virtually any cloud or on-premise application which supports industry-standard SOAP authentication schemes can now securely share login credentials with NetSuite. Single sign-on through SuiteCloud delivers increased productivity and less IT administrative overhead, enabling professionals to focus on value creation, not password management.
• Graphical Business Process Customization – SuiteCloud 2.0 incorporates new graphical workflow management software that for the first time gives users of cloud computing business suites the ability to easily develop, automate and streamline complex business processes with ground-breaking simplicity. This new capability smashes one of the final remaining myths regarding software as a service (SaaS) business applications — that they force companies to alter their normal business processes to accommodate hard-coded workflows that come with the vendor's software. With graphical business process customization, users can quickly point and click to create and alter custom workflows to support the way businesses need to work in real-time — whether the goal is to implement a more efficient automated collections process, create a rules-based lead nurturing process, or overhaul receivables management.

Cloud Customization and Integration Trumps On-Premise Approaches

Cloud customization and integration today is far more powerful than that of traditional on-premise applications, which are based on technology that predates the modern Internet. NetSuite's modern, open and standards-based approach to customization and interoperability offers numerous advantages over the proprietary languages and obsolete paradigms used by the likes of SAP, Microsoft and Sage. Only the power of cloud computing protects customization and add-on functionality, ensuring that applications built on the SuiteCloud platform migrate seamlessly with new version upgrades. With modern cloud computing, users need not fear being trapped in a particular version of the application.

Not All Cloud Platforms are Equal

Not all cloud platforms offer ISVs the power and flexibility of SuiteCloud for managing and upgrading applications. Force.com ,from salesforce.com, lacks SuiteCloud's automatic migration capabilities, forcing ISVs to maintain multiple versions of their extensions for different customers due to reinstallation concerns. In some cases, Force.com applications become version-locked due to further customer modifications. The latest updates to the SuiteCloud platform eliminate these headaches for NetSuite development partners. With SuiteCloud's SuiteBundler, ISVs can push new versions of their applications to all customers with a single click. Customers receive true "upgrade while you sleep" protection—one of the core value propositions of cloud computing.

For more information about NetSuite Inc., 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.