Sun Microsystems' largest West Coast integrator realizes 20 percent savings in support staff, 40 percent revenue growth
San Mateo, CA July 19, 2005 Santa Clara, Calif.-based Helio Solutions, Sun Microsystems' largest West Coast technology integrator, has implemented NetSuite for its front- and back-office needs by replacing Peachtree and its proprietary customer relationship management (CRM) package.
Helio said its deployment of NetSuite to all 60 of its employees has helped the company bring order to its fast-growing operations. Helio has reported increased productivity and efficiency savings of 20 percent in its support staff and 40 percent revenue growth from $53 million to $88 million, ranking Helio Solutions in the top half of the VARBusiness 500 list of the industry's largest value-added resellers.
Previously, using Peachtree for accounting and a proprietary CRM package for sales, marketing and customer support, Helio Solutions ran into some challenges. The company outgrew entry-level accounting and CRM solutions; reporting and forecasting were cumbersome, time-consuming and error prone; and no central repository of data supported sales and marketing teams' initiatives.
Consequently, Helio decided to replace the old software. After evaluating a few other software packages such as SAP and salesforce.com, Helio turned to NetSuite.
By adopting NetSuite to manage its back-office and customer-facing operations, Helio Solutions said it has been able to preserve its fast-track approach to building business, and said it has the assurance that it won't outrun its ability to analyze trends or serve customers. The company also has insight into revenue and profitability, and because order processing and management are processed through NetSuite, service personnel have insight into order status, reducing lead times and improving the speed and quality of the support process.
NetSuite is a key ingredient to the double-digit sales increases we're experiencing year over year, said Bert Condensa, executive vice president of Sales and Marketing for Helio Solutions. "I would need an incremental 15 to 20 percent support staff if we were still running on the older system, especially to get the sales reporting and forecasting information I am getting now with NetSuite."
