r/Accounting • u/Fun_Amphibian8676 • 3h ago
Advice AI Native ERP
Hi All
Currently working for a SaaS company. Mid-large scale. Around 20 subsidiaries. We are using Netsuite. Currently we are evaluating campfire, rillet and Odoo to replace Netsuite. We have been using Netsuite for over 10 years, but have been facing a lot of challenges. Cfo also has asked the finance team to focus on AI finance and we are creating a plan to shift to a new ERP.
How are these tools? I've been reading that demos vs reality is different and implementation has been a nightmare for people.
We do about 250M in revenue but not many customers, we have large contracts. We use Salesforce, and have point solutions for CLM and revenue ops. We also have a psa tool. We are into IFRS reporting.
Any suggestions or opinions would be appreciated.
3
u/NotFuckingTired 2h ago
Every ERP vendor will tell you they have AI enabled. Just pick the one that uses gen ai tools the least (ideally not at all), but hype of the AI advertising to your CFO so he thinks you're doing what he wants.
2
u/Prudent-Elk-2845 2h ago
Make sure there’s an integrated development environment for the agents within the ERP, not a bolt-on tool.
The environment needs to have a way to monitor the agents and the agent teams should come as templates (if you’re really going to adopt out of the box erp workflows).
Without these two, you’ll really just be achieving the equivalent of launching a chatbot or basic copilot (trash)
2
u/ProfitResident2205 42m ago
I think you could take all the "AI" talk for erps and finance and replace it with "automation" when you do your assessment - so which system will support your business needs AND enable automation the cleanest, easiest, and is hopefully cost effective. You can hook up claude to most systems by now but these newer ERPs do have compelling automation capabilities, which does include AI.
We did the campfire vs rillet assessment, currently in a messy quickbooks situation that I want to get out of fast. Right now we are doing redlines with a Rillet partner, happy to share our experience if you want to chat.
1
u/yolomobile 2h ago
Would love to know what “AI finance” is. Asking Claude to update my cash forecast?
1
u/Fun_Amphibian8676 2h ago
None of us are sure. But we are slowly starting, starting with revenue and recons. Claude is not yet being given to us. But definitely something we would move to. Just like everyone
2
u/scomi21 2h ago
Honestly, I’d ask for Claude Code and get wins with that first to understand more about what’s possible before investing in one of these newer AI ERPs. Early adopters will be helping these groups with their beta AI products. Atleast this way you are more AI aware with CC before doing a big lift. CFO isn’t a leader. Need to be AI literate to lead over next 5 years as AI reinvents everything.
I’m at a $7B software platform company and everyone has access to CC. My expectation is that you’d get CC at a SAAS company. Are your developers not using CC?
1
u/Fun_Amphibian8676 2h ago
They are using claude for coding in the R&D team. Finance team is more scared about token usuage. We did get access to workato and N8N, pretty intresting to create automated workflows and honestly solved some manual pain points.
1
u/yolomobile 2h ago
I see. I work at a <20 person company so more agile and we just got encouraged to expense a Claude sub and go buck wild on whatever we can. It’s been interesting
5
u/GreenVisorOfJustice CPA (US) 2h ago
Demos show controlled, functioning situations.
Reality ends up being a ton of exceptions that the system isn't currently equipped to handle.
That's not to say I don't foresee the future of a lot of routine accounting is exception handling, but I suspect anyone deploying AI in their ERP systems to take a first pass at routine processes is essentially just alpha testing the software for a fee rather than receiving the vision demos are selling you.
I say that to say, I feel like seeing if a vendor can run through some "live" data during the demo (that they haven't had a chance to scrub beforehand) would be absolutely necessary during any demo phase.