Oracle NetSuite has unveiled NetSuite Next at SuiteWorld in Las Vegas, representing the platform’s biggest transformation since its founding 25 years ago. EVP and founder, Evan Goldberg, revealed that this AI-centric NetSuite Next is built on five years of development that will position the platform for the generative AI revolution.
NetSuite Next represents a fundamental shift in how users interact with business applications. Moving beyond traditional point-and-click interfaces, the platform centers around conversational AI powered by Ask Oracle, Oracle’s enterprise AI assistant.
Goldberg explained: “The next generation of computer software applications you will talk to, because that’s what humans have evolved to do.” He continues, “It didn’t evolve to point and click. We evolved to talk.” That doesn’t mean that everything will be done through conversation. It will, however, be the primary mode of interacting with business applications in the future.
The traditional user experience doesn’t disappear, but it becomes secondary to the primary conversational interface. This approach ensures users can work in whatever mode feels most natural while gradually adopting AI-powered workflows.
Also read: NetSuite Next: what does the future hold for NetSuite?
A five-year bet on rebuilding the platform for AI
The timing of NetSuite Next reveals strategic foresight that predates the ChatGPT revolution. Approximately five years ago, as NetSuite approached its 25th anniversary, leadership recognized the need to retool for the future.
“We realized that at approaching 25 years old, it was a good time to look at retooling NetSuite for the future,” Goldberg said. “Not knowing how technology was going to change, but knowing that it definitely was going to change. We wanted to have a robust foundation so that NetSuite would be as vital in 25 years as it was at the time.”
This development converged with Oracle’s work on Ask Oracle, which Goldberg first learned about when NetSuite began its next-generation technology initiative. The combination of NetSuite’s modernized foundation and Oracle’s advancing AI capabilities created the perfect storm for transformation.
Ask Oracle: The centerpiece of NetSuite Next
Ask Oracle serves as the primary interface for NetSuite Next, a collaboration between NetSuite and Oracle spanning several years. AI assistants have evolved far beyond initial expectations. Oracle didn’t anticipate AI’s rapid rise to dominance when it started developing Ask Oracle. With advances in natural language understanding enabled by large language models, chatbots like Ask Oracle can be much more intelligent.
The new NetSuite Next platform, combined with Ask Oracle, will mark an evolution in generative AI, according to Goldberg. It will be moving beyond text, image, and video generation to interact directly with structured business data. Goldberg compared this transformation to the early days of the internet, when displaying information evolved into interactive cloud applications like NetSuite.
“I think there’s an evolution now of generative AI in general moving away from just being an engine for text or image or video, but actually starting to be able to interact directly with structured data and databases,” he explained. “Combining your unstructured data with your structured data.”
This capability is enabled by technologies like the Model Context Protocol, which exposes business data not as text but as business objects that AI can understand and manipulate.
Suite Agents and the new role of prompt engineering
NetSuite Next will introduce Suite Agents, which fundamentally change how business automation works. Instead of programming agents in JavaScript or other traditional languages, users describe what they want the agent to do in natural language.
“Agents are going to be built from prompts,” Goldberg revealed. “You’re going to say here’s the description of the agent. And then the agent knows how to turn that into SuiteScript or turn that into JSON or XML or REST or whatever else it needs to do.”
This transformation elevates prompt engineering from a supporting role to a central discipline at NetSuite. The technology initially targets administrators rather than general business users, but the roadmap aims toward enabling any business user to design agents that solve their daily problems.
Existing AI features, such as Text Enhance and prompt engineering capabilities, remain on the platform but take on new importance in this AI-first architecture.
Seamless transition and Oracle Fusion integration
Despite the fundamental transformation, NetSuite Next doesn’t require a complete migration. Users can start using it next year by “basically flipping a switch,” according to Goldberg. The platform includes numerous user experience improvements developed over several years, including infinite scrolling in lists and new search and filtering options.
Ask Oracle’s integration across Oracle’s product portfolio opens significant possibilities for NetSuite customers. The assistant is being integrated into all Fusion applications, potentially enabling cross-application data access and workflows.
NetSuite already offers Oracle enterprise products within the NetSuite platform, including NetSuite Analytics Warehouse and NetSuite Enterprise Performance Management. The Ask Oracle integration could facilitate commerce and data exchange between companies using NetSuite and those using Fusion applications.
“I think we have more opportunities for commerce between companies that use NetSuite and companies that use Fusion with Ask Oracle as sort of intermediary there,” Goldberg noted. “I think that’s a really exciting possibility for the future.”
Preview coming soon, community feedback needed
NetSuite is taking an unusual approach by announcing the product 6-12 months before general availability. The company previewed NetSuite Next on the show floor at SuiteWorld and plans to offer a preview mode in just a few months.
The strategy aims to include NetSuite’s 8,000 SuiteWorld attendees in shaping the platform’s future. “This is a conversation nobody can say with any confidence they know how the AI age is going to evolve, and so we’re all inventing it together,” Goldberg emphasized.
NetSuite hopes to leverage the collective intelligence and feedback from the NetSuite user community to create the best possible version of NetSuite Next.
Biggest update since NetSuite’s founding
Goldberg characterized NetSuite Next as “the biggest change in how you interact with business applications probably ever since they were invented, and certainly the biggest change to NetSuite since it was founded.”
NetSuite Next promises to offer a complete AI-native platform and be one of the first SaaS players to offer a next-generation business application. It wants to fundamentally transform daily workflows from data entry and report generation to natural conversation and intelligent automation. As the AI age continues to evolve, NetSuite Next should remain vital for the next 25 years. That’s a big promise. Within a few months, we can start evaluating NetSuite Next and hear from customers whether it can live up to all of its promises.