NetSuite Expedites Aesop's International Expansion

SAN JOSE, Calif., May 15, 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 that Aesop, one of Australia's largest beauty export brands, has selected NetSuite OneWorld as its business management suite to power its rapidly expanding international business, replacing over 10 disparate on-premise applications, including Sage Pastel, Sage Accounting, QuickBooks, Access and numerous Excel spreadsheets. Aesop is switching to a single instance of NetSuite OneWorld to manage its core business processes, including financials, demand planning, inventory management, order management, project management and manufacturing. NetSuite OneWorld also provides multi-subsidiary, multi-language and multi-currency support that can allow Aesop to manage its global operations in real-time by consolidating financials in six languages for 11 different currencies, and automating reporting and performing cost of sales analytics in 12 countries, including Australia, USA, UK, France, Switzerland, Germany, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Malaysia.

Established in Melbourne in 1987, Aesop offers a range of meticulously formulated skin, hair and body care, with a commitment to using both plant-based and laboratory-made ingredients of the highest quality and proven efficacy. Its products are available in more than 150 Aesop signature stores and department store counters in 12 countries, as well as online.  Aesop now employs more than 700 people and expects to significantly increase its international footprint in the coming years, with signature stores in South America and Scandinavia opening later in 2014. With this level of historic and projected growth, it became increasingly clear that the company's multiple on-site software systems could not support future needs with the speed and agility required to move swiftly into new markets.

"The key driver for moving to NetSuite is our rapid international growth, as well as the need for flexible scalability," commented Troy Smith, Global Head of ICT, Aesop. "Our legacy systems spread across multiple markets were ill-equipped to deal with our international expansion plans and cracks soon began to show. NetSuite offers us the requisite speed, agility, flexibility and scalability to seamlessly support our future needs, particularly expansion into new markets. Given our global ambitions, the multi-currency and multi-language capabilities of NetSuite OneWorld were a standout for us."

Aesop evaluated a number of global on-premise and cloud solutions before determining that NetSuite's cloud-based business management suite met all requirements in a single, scalable solution – at a considerable cost saving comparative to traditional on-premise ERP solutions. The suite will also integrate effortlessly with Aesop's current ecommerce and in-store POS systems; the latter is expected to support over 5 million transactions annually.

"NetSuite's people and resources were also key factors in our decision to make the switch," added Mr. Smith. "Aesop is renowned for its highly relationship-driven approach to customer, employee and partner activities. This is of paramount importance to us and we were delighted that NetSuite proved to be superior in both technology and its people and expertise."

Once NetSuite OneWorld is deployed, the next phase for Aesop is to explore possible ecommerce and POS opportunities with NetSuite, which can allow the company to run its omnichannel commerce business on NetSuite's single unified platform.  

Mr. Smith continued, "NetSuite's Software-as-a-Service approach gives us the flexibility to add additional solutions as needed when the business is ready. Along with the operational flexibility this affords, it also means that we can treat it as an OPEX vs. CAPEX cost, providing the security of predictable annual TCO costs, while eliminating the need for costly upgrades and maintenance costs."

According to Mark Troselj, managing director of APAC and Japan for NetSuite, "Aesop is an Australian export success story and we are delighted that NetSuite OneWorld can underpin its strategic vision and operational success as it continues its international expansion. Aesop is one of a growing number of smart Australian businesses leveraging the transformational capabilities of cloud-based solutions to support international growth. It can gain much needed visibility into every single aspect of its global operations, regardless of language, currency, time zone and location."

Melbourne-based NetSuite partner Annexa has been selected to deploy the solution at Aesop. Annexa specialises in providing front- and back-end software solutions to Australian commerce businesses and is part of the NetSuite Solution Provider Program, the industry's first cloud channel partner program that brings industry leading margins and incentives to hundreds of channel partners.

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 ERP suites for divisions of large enterprises and mid-sized organisations seeking to upgrade their antiquated client/server ERP systems. NetSuite excels at streamlining business operations, as demonstrated by a recent Gartner study naming NetSuite as the fastest growing top 10 financial management systems vendor in the world. NetSuite continues its success in delivering the best cloud ERP/financial suites to businesses around the world, enabling them to lower IT costs significantly while increasing productivity, as the global adoption of the cloud accelerates.

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

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SOURCE NetSuite Inc.