We have the opportunity to attend Ultimate Software’s user conference #UltiConnect in Las Vegas. The conference is well attended, with a record 2400 attendees. 
 

So let’s look at the top 3 takeaways

Ultimate and NetSuite partner – This certainly came as a surprise – but as NetSuite CEO Zach Nelson and Ultimate CTO Adam Rogers positioned it – it’s all about helping customers to be more successful. And vendor built integration is actually highly valued by enterprises. So a good partnership for both vendors – we will now have to dive more into the details. It also questions what this partnership means for the Oracle / NetSuite HCM partnership (read here) and the TribeHR positioning of NetSuite (here are my acquisition notes). It certainly means that NetSuite has realized that to stay competitive in the HCM market – more investment is needed than the vendor may want to put in today – and so the team at NetSuite decided to partner. (And here is my SuiteWorld event report).
 
Adam Rogers open UltiConnect
Roadmap – Ultimate shared the roadmap plans for 2016 and we need to look more into a lot of details – but it looks like the heavy hitters are a new Workforce Management solution, more global capabilities (UltiPro just added German and Dutch), Payroll enhancements, and more integration and configuration capabilities. 
 
UltimatePro 2016 Roadmap

Analytics – Ultimate is no exception at putting more ‘real’ analytics into HCM. It was great to see Rogers starting with analytic functionalities being the first to list on new functionalities recently added. And equally analytics are the key additions Ultimate plans to add to its Talent Management capabilities in 2015 / 2016 as Cecile Alper Leroux shared.
 
And the beyond 2016 UltPro Roadmap

MyPOV

A great start of Ultimate’s UltiConnect conference – more meetings and briefings to follow today – so stay tuned for the event report.


No time to read - check out my Meerkat capture of the product highlights: 
 
 


More on Ultimate from me:
  • Event Report - Ultimate's UltiConnect - Off to a great start, but the road(map) is long - read here.
  • First Take – 3 Key Takeaways from Ultimate’s UltiConnect Conference Day 1 keynote – read here.
More on NetSuite here:
  • Event Report - NetSuite powers on with targeted innovation - read here
  • Why NetSuite acquired TribeHR - read here
  • Act III the cloud changes everything - Oracle and NetSuite with a touche of Deloitte - read here
  • Act III and final day - A tale of two conferences - Sapphire and SuiteWorld - read here
  • The middle day - 2 keynotes and press releases - Sapphire and SuiteWorld - read here
  • A tale of 2 keynotes and press releases - Sapphire and SuiteWorld - read here
Find more coverage on the Constellation Research website here.