NetSuite Proves a Bid Winner for Empired

SYDNEY, Nov. 17, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- NetSuite Inc. (NYSE: N), the industry's leading provider of cloud-based financials / ERP software suites, today announced that Empired Ltd. (ASX:EPD), a nationwide IT services provider, went live on NetSuite OneWorld Services Resource Planning (SRP) to better manage  its core services business operations. With NetSuite OneWorld SRP, Empired is able to operationally manage the full customer business lifecycle from customer engagement management (including competitive tender management), resource planning and scheduling, project management (including logistic and financial project management), invoice generation, ongoing customer relationship management and ecommerce for customers ordering additional products and services. The system also provides Empired with full financial reporting.

NetSuite OneWorld SRP replaced Empired's six software systems, including Salesforce.com, QuickBooks, Replicon Timesheets and Scheduling, as well as in-house built systems for financial forecasting and project management. The manual integration of these solutions failed to provide Empired with real-time visibility of its resource capacity, business performance and profitability, hindering the company's ability to react to changes within the business and scale rapidly.

Empired selected NetSuite OneWorld SRP over Oracle, SAP and Microsoft solutions, after a year long investigation of CRM, ERP and financial software solutions specifically tailored to professional services organisations. As a cloud solution, NetSuite OneWorld SRP's ease of use, simpler and shorter installation process, and significantly reduced market-entry and maintenance costs, made it the clear winner for Empired.

Empired's timely transition to NetSuite OneWorld SRP is now supporting the 200-strong IT services firm's continued growth, with current plans for national expansion into the Sydney and Brisbane markets over the next two years, beyond its Perth headquarters and Melbourne office.

NetSuite's SuiteCloud development platform provides flexible and powerful customisation capabilities, allowing Empired to easily adapt NetSuite to meet its business needs. "NetSuite OneWorld SRP offered one solution that is extremely well tailored to professional services organisations like ours. What little customisation was required, we could do in-house with a small amount of training, as opposed to hiring a software engineer or developer to do it," said Mark Waller, chief financial officer for Empired Ltd.

Discussing the complexity of Empired's previous processes, Mr. Waller said: "We were limited by how many projects our consultants and project managers could work on because of the considerable time it took to consolidate and check data housed in separate software systems.  Resources too were often underutilised as we lacked the visibility to quickly see when and where resources might be available."

"NetSuite OneWorld SRP gives Empired a fully integrated solution that takes us from customer opportunity management through project management to invoice payment, with the appropriate reporting and dashboards throughout the lengthy process," added Mr. Waller. "And the business lifecycle management tool and resource planning capability can help us take advantage of emerging market growth opportunities."

"As Empired prepares to continue its national expansion, we're thrilled it chose NetSuite OneWorld SRP to help power that growth," said Mark Troselj, managing director of APAC for NetSuite. "By switching to one centralised, modern cloud-based system, Empired now has a tool to see in real-time how every aspect of its business is performing and where opportunities lie. This knowledge clears up the blind spots multiple software systems create and is critical in enabling Empired to maximise its growth opportunities in today's competitive market."

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

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SOURCE NetSuite Inc.