On 25 March 2021 (Thursday), AFON hosted a joint webinar with Oracle on what it takes to build the foundation to achieve success in expanding your business internationally.
We had the fortune to have Mr. Kenny Hong – a Senior Manager at Solution Consulting for Oracle NetSuite with more than 20 years of experience in ERP, CRM and Business Applications – join us as a fellow panelist for the joint webinar.
In this hour-long webinar, we covered the macro-economic trends that poses challenges to a business’s international expansion efforts, why businesses should adopt cloud technology to overcome these challenges, and why they should choose Oracle NetSuite – the #1 true cloud ERP software in the world – to support their international expansion efforts.
Here are some of the key highlights of the webinar.
Macro-Economic Trends That Impact Successful International Expansion
According to an ASEAN Growth Forecast 2021 produced by GlobalData Business Fundamentals, economies throughout Southeast Asia are expected to bounce back strongly in 2021.
With the rates of COVID-19 cases dropping by the day, along with vaccines for the coronavirus being rolled out, the end of the pandemic is in sight.
This has led to governments in the region easing restrictions and increasing spending to revitalise their economies, which led GlobalData to forecast an average increase of 6% in real GDP across the board.
Thanks to this positive outlook of the near future, many businesses like yours are planning to move ahead with their plans for international expansion.
Of the respondents in the GlobalData study, 83% are planning to establish a remote, global workforce model on a permanent basis, in response to the lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic.
45% are also in the midst of expanding their businesses globally, and despite slight delays to their expansion plans resulting from the pandemic, are planning to achieve those goals within a year.
But challenges associated with international expansion always have to be taken into account, and are certainly on the minds of those planning to take their businesses international.
According to a survey carried out by Frost & Sullivan, 25% of executives are highly concerned about possible IT-related issues that might crop up as a result of their international expansion efforts.
This is especially the case for businesses in the Media and Entertainment industries, where 50% of executives expressed the same sentiment about expansion-related IT issues.
Respondents in other industries also brought up their own primary concerns about their own expansion efforts.
For example, executives in Financial Services were worried about facing possible legal complexities, while those in Manufacturing, Education, and Retail/E-commerce businesses brought up the difficulties of accounting in multiple jurisdictions.
As for the CIOs and other IT leaders in these businesses, their biggest worries about their international expansion efforts involve legacy systems which are not integrated, and could not share business data with each other.
This would mean that any insights their leadership could glean from their legacy systems would be outdated, leaving them unable to make informed business decisions and compromising the success of their expansion plans.
A common thread of thought amongst executives in the Frost & Sullivan study is that adopting cloud technology is the answer to the aforementioned concerned, with 75% of respondents believing that doing so can address the IT-related issues arising from internation expansion efforts.
Overcoming International Expansion Challenges With The Cloud
The webinar covered the four main reasons that businesses planning on an international expansion should adopt cloud computing to overcome the challenges that comes with the effort.
1. Scalability
Cloud software work on a subscription model, which means they can be easily scaled in line with the growth of your business. They are also purchased through non-perpetual licenses, which means your business will not be locked into paying fixed costs like would be the case with on-premise software.
2. Innovation
By adopting cloud software, businesses like yours can also benefit from the product innovation made by the software-as-a-service (SaaS) or platform-as-a-service (PaaS) vendor who provided the software.
3. Upgrades
Adopting cloud software can help mitigate risks for your business, as the vendor is responsible for keeping it up to date. Such vendors also usually offer an ecosystem of cloud-based applications which integrate seamlessly with the software product.
4. Headcount
Vendors of cloud software can provide IT expertise in areas such as security and maintenance. This allows you to devote in-house IT resources towards maximising value in your business.
Why Should You Choose NetSuite To Support Your International Expansion?
Finally, the webinar highlighted the strengths of Oracle NetSuite, and why businesses today are turning to the true cloud ERP software to support their international expansion efforts.
Deployed in more than 200 countries, NetSuite natively supports the tax reporting and compliance regimes of more than 100 countries, up to 27 languages, more than 190 currencies, and over 90 bank payment formats.
In addition, the cloud ERP software can be upgraded with the NetSuite OneWorld module, which greatly enhances support for businesses expanding into the markets of other countries. Some of its key features include:
- Country Localisations
- Doing Business Between Subsidiaries
- Intercompany Journal Entries
- Intercompany Allocations
- Foreign Exchange on Transactions
- Auto-elimination of Duplicate Entries
- Cumulative Translation Adjustment (CTA)
Apart from supporting expansion into international markets, Oracle NetSuite is also designed to enable the growth of your business in general.
It’s designed to scale with the growth of your business, offers 99.99% uptime, utilises technology such as multi-level caching and SSDs to maximise efficiency, and uses the same security standards as financial institutions.
In addition, the multi-tenant architecture of NetSuite offers benefits such as:
- Economies of Scale: Results in savings passed on to customers
- No Version-Lock: Eliminates all issues with outdated software
- Evolving Regulations: Keeps customers up to date with standards such as VAT and ASC 606 Rev Rec
- Customisations: Enables customers to customise NetSuite to best fit business practices
- Investing in the Future: Oracle continuously invests in the latest innovations, which are then rolled out to NetSuite customers
Last but not least, the NetSuite SuiteSuccess methodology combines 20 years of industry-leading practices, a new customer engagement model, and business optimisation methods to help small, rapidly-growing businesses like yours implement and deploy Oracle NetSuite in less than 100 days, and at an affordable and accessible rate.
Find The SuiteSuccess Package That Best Suit Your Business Needs Here.
To learn more details on how to have a successful international expansion and what Oracle NetSuite can do for your business, click the image below to watch the on-demand webinar.
