SugarCRM has lured Paul Farrell from Oracle NetSuite to become its next Chief Product Officer. Farrell will take over the role from Paul Sprackett, who will retain his role as Chief Technology Officer. Farrell has more than three decades of experience leading ERP and CRM product teams across multiple industry sectors.
He was SVP of Product Marketing at NetSuite. When Oracle acquired the company, he continued in the role as VP of Industry Product Management. A consummate speaker, he is a great hire for SugarCRM as it looks to continue its expansion.
Craig Charlton, SugarCRM Chief Executive Officer, commented, “I’m pleased to welcome Paul to SugarCRM. His Chief Product Officer appointment is very intentional as we continue to recruit talent with steadfast industry, strategy and technical prowess and expertise to power our industry vision and execution, starting in the manufacturing and wholesale distribution sectors. Paul will drive our go-to-market efforts and ensure our sales, service, support and development efforts are fit to address the specific needs of this burgeoning market.”
A new focus on Manufacturing
Farrell also spent more than 15 years at Epicor. Holding roles spanning product marketing and leading R&D for the manufacturing ERP vendor. In the release issued by SugarCRM, it notes that the manufacturing CRM software market is expected to witness significant growth from 2024 to 2031. The appointment would seem to indicate that SugarCRM sees an opportunity in this market for further expansion. It already boasts customers such as Materion, HPE, Agfa and Engenco. It will be interesting to see how it develops the solution. By leveraging AI to monetize data, accelerate lead-to-cash, prioritize service excellence, and manage activities throughout the customer lifecycle in the future.
Farrell commented, “I’m incredibly excited about the CRM opportunity in manufacturing and distribution, and even more so about SugarCRM’s opportunities to deliver industry-specific solutions. Manufacturers and wholesale distributors are working to get closer to the end customer and take advantage of new business models such as subscriptions and recurring revenue. SugarCRM helps organizations galvanize and maximize their global resources to provide the best products for customers to capitalize on these new growth and revenue opportunities.”
Enterprise Times: What does this mean?
This is a great appointment for SugarCRM and will be an equally massive loss to NetSuite. Farrell has a wealth of knowledge and deep experience across several industries. What will be interesting to see is how, now it has a CSuite role, he will influence the product management within SugarCRM. NetSuite has been incredibly successful over the last few years, and Farrell has been part of that journey.
