NetSuite 2024.1 Brings AI to Life with Text Enhance, Bill Capture, and More

For many businesses, the launch of ChatGPT served as a catalyst to start looking at use cases for artificial intelligence (AI). Despite high interest, however, companies are struggling with exactly how they should push forward with AI, our research shows. In a survey conducted by NetSuite of over 500 executives in October, 85% said that increasing AI adoption would be at least somewhat important in the next year with over a third saying it would be “very important” or “the most important thing we’ll do.” Yet most organisations don't actually have their hands on AI yet—only 30% are actually using or even testing AI. 40% are evaluating AI products to test or will evaluate over the next 12 months. Just 26% have no plans for AI.

NetSuite 2024 Release 1 offers new AI capabilities that can jumpstart companies’ AI use, without all the cost and complexity. Helping to assist and advise, this latest release offers three AI-powered tools built into NetSuite—for text generation, capturing invoice information while eliminating manual data entry, and automating data analysis in planning and budgeting. All of these are focused on helping companies accomplish more while spending less.

Speed up business writing with generative AI

The NetSuite Text Enhance feature, powered by Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI)(opens in a new tab) generative AI service, embeds generative AI in numerous tasks across the suite to draft personalised, contextual content using relevant NetSuite data. Employees can then assess and revise that first draft content, speeding up their work.

In this release, Text Enhance should help increase efficiency of customer service, HR, and marketing teams. Text Enhance is able to:

• Create product descriptions for invoices, websites, and point-of-sale systems
• Write job descriptions and requisitions
• Draft employee goals and suggest measures for success

The Text Enhance feature can also refine existing content by editing grammar and spelling, as well as rephrasing as needed for better readability.

The first version of Text Enhance is only available to NetSuite customers in North America. NetSuite plans to increase coverage and capabilities in future releases.

Upload invoice data without manual effort

When asked what benefits they wanted from AI, the overwhelming majority of those surveyed cited productivity, wanting the ability to automate and reduce time around routine tasks. And 74% expect AI innovations to help accounting and finance the most. This release addresses those expectations with enhancements to NetSuite Bill Capture.

The NetSuite Bill Capture(opens in a new tab) feature captures vendor invoices more quickly and with fewer errors by eliminating manual data entry and automating the invoice capture process. Invoices are scanned and AI-based document object detection and optical character recognition automatically extract needed information to populate the bill record. The system then matches invoices with associated purchase orders and receiving documents to check that pricing, quantities, and totals are accurate.

In NetSuite 2024 Release 1, additional fields–including PO number, memo, posting period, discount date, and custom segments–have been added to the Review Bill page. In addition to greater flexibility to suit a company’s specific needs, these updates provide a more comprehensive and accurate bill creation experience. When Bill Capture intelligence is given more data to work with, it decreases the likelihood of bill creation failure or needed edits after creation.

NetSuite 2024.1 enhancements also bring a better user experience to Bill Capture. The option to filter by vendor, upload source, and email source have been added to the Scanned Vendor Bills page. Particularly for those with a large number of uploaded bills, these new filters allow for easier searchability with the option to filter by source and vendor either simultaneously or separately.

Improve planning with predictive analytics

57% of executives in our survey want improved forecasting, business, analytics, and decision support from AI. The 2024.1 release provides that by bringing Intelligent Performance Management (IPM) to NetSuite Planning and Budgeting

IPM uses predictive algorithms powered by machine learning to continuously monitor and analyse plans, forecasts, and variances. The system highlights the trends, anomalies, biases, and correlations it finds so finance can assess and take faster action on those insights.

• Forecast Variance and Bias. The forecast variance metric helps finance teams assess the reliability of their forecasts by measuring the deviation between historical scenarios and actual outcomes. Forecast bias identifies tendencies to over or under forecast for adjusting future predictions.
• Predictions. Helps identify the likelihood of meeting or missing a target forecast by analysing variations between forecasted figures and computer-generated predictions, quantifying associated risk and enabling proactive measures for finance teams to address significant deviations in forecasts.
• Anomalies. Helps unearth unusual patterns in data that deviate from expected results by identifying unusual patterns and outlier values in data, providing crucial information for strategic decision-making, such as sudden volatility in actuals or missing data.

Learn more about all the updates in NetSuite 2024.1

For many, the promise of AI has seemed unattainable due to cost and complexity. NetSuite 2024.1 brings the potential of the technology in reach. NetSuite 2024 Release 1 contains a host of other innovative new enhancements across the suite. Be sure to read more about what else is in the release on our Sneak Peek page(opens in a new tab) or dive deep into the release notes(opens in a new tab). Most importantly, don't forget to request your Release Preview(opens in a new tab) test account for hands-on access to see how new features will work with your data, workflows, and customisations.

The preceding is intended to outline our general product direction. It is intended for information purposes only, and may not be incorporated into any contract. It is not a commitment to deliver any material, code, or functionality, and should not be relied upon in making purchasing decisions. The development, release, timing, and pricing of any features or functionality described for Oracle’s products may change and remains at the sole discretion of Oracle Corporation.