LAS VEGAS—On Monday, NetSuite partners heard from Evan Goldberg, the founder of the Oracle-owned cloud-based ERP platform, that all of NetSuite’s products would be moving to the new Oracle-wide “Redwood” design and user experience standard.

By Wednesday morning, they had plenty of exposure to Redwood as the company debuted an updated partner portal built around the design language. In announcing the move to Redwood, Goldberg said the company’s goal is to deliver a “consumer-grade experience” to its enterprise software, and it’s clear that in 2024, consumer-grade means a healthy dose of AI. Goldberg described the goals of making the software easier for its users to use and, where possible, using AI to take action without user intervention.

“We want to make for more natural actions,” Goldberg said. “In some situations, the interaction will be handled for you, and when your input is required, the experience will be smooth.”

Craig West, NetSuite’s vice president of alliances and channels, said moving the partner portal to Redwood has a dual effect. First, it modernizes the user experience and allows NetSuite to provide access to more tools and assets. Second, it helps partners start to get their minds around Redwood, which will become the default user experience for NetSuite’s applications and will likely be an expectation for the applications, integrations, and last-mile extensions partners offer as part of NetSuite-centric solutions.

“[Partners are] going to have to change how they build those,” West said. “But our tools that they use to build with will start to build them in a more Redwood-consistent way. The tools will be contextualized around Redwood, and our partners will embrace it.”

West admitted that it would mean a change in mindset for partners, considering that the majority of the NetSuite channel come to the business as “accountants and technologists” and not as artists or designers. 

The company hopes a bump in user experience on the partner portal will help partners see the benefit the design language can have for their customers. West quipped that partner portals “aren’t sexy.” They’re an expected part of what vendors offer to partners. But with the Redwood redesign and AI underpinnings, the company believes it can make it easier and faster for partners to find the resources and information they want when they want it. 

“We can make it more efficient and pleasant for them,” West said.

West said the new portal, with its overhauled design and addition of AI tools, furthers NetSuite’s goal of providing role-specific tools and assets for all the employees of partner organizations, with the addition of new roles and personas.

“We have to provide that information in a multi-dimensional pivot,” West said. “So whether I’m coming in as a functional consultant, practice leader, business owner, or marketer, I’m getting what I need easily.”

The new partner portal was debuted to partners today at the company’s partner presentations, part of its SuiteWorld event this week.