1. NetSuite Integration
  2. NetSuite Integration Overview

NetSuite Integration Overview

The OpenAir NetSuite integration provides a seamless flow of information between the OpenAir Professional Services Automation (PSA) and NetSuite Financials (ERP). It lets you leverage the strength of both system and create an integrated solutions for greater collaboration, automation and efficiency gains across your enterprise.

You can use the NetSuite integration to integrate your data on demand, on a defined schedule, or in real time.

You can specify the data you want to exchange between NetSuite and OpenAir to suit your business processes and requirements. Common integrated data elements include customers, employees, items you sell and the projects and invoices you create. With the integration set up, you enter information one time and it is shared automatically between the two applications, leading to better data quality and accuracy.

With the OpenAir Within NetSuite (NetSuite Single Sign-On Integration) feature, you can view all your project information from within NetSuite without having to sign in to OpenAir separately. Company executives can view all company project metrics alongside sales, financials and other key performance indicators from within NetSuite. Users gain visibility into service delivery from a single dashboard, with an overview of project execution, staffing and financials.

For an overview of the main NetSuite integration features, see NetSuite Integration Main Features.

For an overview of NetSuite features requiring special consideration to work with the NetSuite <> OpenAir integration, see Feature Compatibility Check List.

For an overview of how to get started with the NetSuite <> OpenAir integration, see Getting Started With the NetSuite integration.

Example of Typical Usage

In a typical scenario, you would use NetSuite as your primary application for employees, leads, prospects, customers, contacts, vendors, expense categories, projects, and service items and import these into OpenAir. The integration creates and updates OpenAir records so your OpenAir and NetSuite data is synchronized.

You then build a project and connect it to a sales order in NetSuite when estimating the scope, identifying the work to be done for the customer, and specify how each service delivered through the project will be billed (for example by time, by fixed date, ...). The sales order in NetSuite may show other revenue streams in the company, such as hardware sales and subscriptions that are billed separately from your project delivery. You may also create a work breakdown structure in OpenAir to generate and send item estimates back to an opportunity in NetSuite.

You can use OpenAir project templates to prepopulate your projects with commonly used tasks, billing rules, loaded costs, revenue recognition rules, auto-bill settings, and project approvers. OpenAir project templates provide an efficient way to capture and reuse information specific to a particular customer or type of project.

After the sales order is closed and you start delivering work against the project, you can export revenue recognition transactions and invoices generated in OpenAir to NetSuite, using the approval workflow in OpenAir to review the invoice before sending it to NetSuite. You receive payments in OpenAir and automatically update OpenAir so your service delivery staff are kept informed even if they do not have access to your NetSuite financials. Aside from your billing operations, you can manage payments for consultant time and expenses submitted and approved in OpenAir using NetSuite.

With the OpenAir Within NetSuite and One View features providing access to your OpenAir dashboard and report data in NetSuite, you can view your project and financials metrics side-by-side and get a unified view of KPIs such as profitability and revenue forecast to inform both operational and strategical decisions.

NetSuite SuiteSuccess for Services: OpenAir Integration — The video showcases how the OpenAir <> NetSuite integration lets you manage project financials from sales order to billing, invoice payments, expenses tracking and reimbursement from the NetSuite UI.

NetSuite OpenAir: OneView — The video showcases how you can combine project data and reporting from OpenAir into NetSuite to have all important metrics and KPIs in one place and support data-driven decisions.

About this Guide

This guide is provided for account administrators and employees responsible for managing the NetSuite <> OpenAir integration. It covers the information you need to know to manage the integration, to troubleshoot simple problems, to specify the data you want to exchange as your business processes evolve and to take advantage of new features as they are released.

The initial setup of the integration is described for reference purposes only. OpenAir Professional Services configures your OpenAir and NetSuite accounts initially following the leading practice so you can use the integration.

The guide focuses on the latest recommended features available for your OpenAir account. For more information about latest recommendations and to review the features enabled in your current integration setup, see OpenAir NetSuite Connector Health Check.

The guide is organized around the following conceptual topics for ease of reference:

Note:

This is a preliminary version of the new guide. It does not cover all product documentation for OpenAir NetSuite Connector. Note, for example, that the reference pages for each integration workflows are currently placeholders only. More content will be added in future.

For additional information not covered in these help topics, see NetSuite Integration.