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Offered by NetSuite
Most firms racing from startup to an business chief face a selection: limp together with scrappy early programs or endure a pricey platform migration.
DoorDash did neither. The local-commerce large scaled from its 2013 founding by means of IPO and world growth — buying the Helsiniki-based expertise firm Wolt in 2022 and UK-based Deliveroo in 2025 — whereas holding its authentic Oracle NetSuite enterprise system. At the moment, it serves over 50 million shoppers in additional than 40 international locations.*
Chief Accounting Officer Gordon Lee says the key is constructing a scalable ecosystem that enables groups to make use of instruments that work greatest for them.
Selecting flexibility over uniformity
When DoorDash chosen NetSuite as its company monetary management heart, it wasn't on the lookout for a system to implement uniformity. It sought a scalable platform that might join all its programs, from ERP, CRM, HR, sourcing, and extra.
"Our philosophy has been to create a platform that enables our clients and enterprise companions to make use of no matter instruments work greatest for them," Lee says. "Once we're managing development, the vast majority of the dialog is about managing expectations — what folks count on whenever you develop from A to B."
The migration query
Two years after its founding, DoorDash surpassed a million deliveries and expanded into Canada. As the corporate scaled, Lee confronted rising strain from distributors insisting that speedy development required a brand new enterprise platform.
He ran the numbers. The transfer to a different platform may price thousands and thousands and eat months of his staff's focus.
As an alternative, DoorDash stayed with NetSuite, which continued to scale alongside the corporate’s development. Constructed on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, NetSuite delivers the efficiency and reliability of an enterprise platform with out the associated fee or disruption of migration.
Lee concluded: "Why do I hassle to maneuver? I have already got the scalability I would like from NetSuite."
At the moment, DoorDash’s NetSuite backend gives enterprise-grade safety whereas its acquainted entrance finish gives the staff flexibility, making a secure, fashionable basis for sustained, high-velocity development.
Increasing the menu with out the technical indigestion
That flexibility quickly proved invaluable. The power so as to add new purposes rapidly — with out lengthy, pricey integrations — grew to become a significant benefit throughout hypergrowth.
For instance, as DoorDash expanded from restaurant supply into grocery, comfort, and retail, Lee turned to NetSuite’s stock modules to deal with the distinct calls for of these new classes.
“The flexibleness to have and never have, and switch the swap on and off, is straightforward as a result of it’s all built-in,” he explains.
At the moment, DoorDash’s expertise stack spans a number of programs — all integrating seamlessly with NetSuite because the monetary hub. “They do it, and also you’re executed,” Lee says.
Embedding experience to scale smarter, not greater
For Lee, true partnerships flip distributors into a part of the staff — and that’s precisely how he describes NetSuite Superior Buyer Assist (ACS).
"They’re right here with us each week. They know all my schematics, they know all my information infrastructure, they know all my database construction inside NetSuite. Basically, they’re an extension of my staff," Lee explains.
Shut collaboration advantages each events. DoorDash retains NetSuite attuned to the realities of hypergrowth and will get immediate suggestions on expertise functionality and scalability. In flip, NetSuite stays near a marquee buyer. Interplay is ongoing — and frank, in line with Lee.
“We work instantly with NetSuite ACS and sometimes ask, 'Can NetSuite do that?’ If they’ll show it may well, we stick with NetSuite."
One other profit is the power to increase DoorDash's experience with out increasing headcount.
"If somebody says to me, 'Gordon, you're simply an accountant. How have you learnt about programs? I say, I don't. I’ve a community man with us, an knowledgeable.’ That's the form of companion I wish to encompass myself with, in order that I can develop past what I’m.”
By embedding experience inside our partnerships, DoorDash scales with precision and management. Lee says the mannequin applies to different firms making ready for IPOs or world growth. He provides that sustainable development relies upon as a lot on shared understanding as on expertise itself.
Too typically, finance and IT “take a look at the identical requirement however see fully various things,” Lee says, describing what he calls the “blue versus purple” downside. “The accountant doesn’t perceive the configuration of the system,” he explains. “The IT man doesn’t perceive what the accountant was making an attempt to inform them.”
NetSuite bridges that hole. With a unified information mannequin and built-in greatest practices throughout finance, operations, and extra, it retains groups aligned and data constant. That shut collaboration, Lee notes, is what retains rollouts clean, information clear, and development sustainable at any stage.
AI technique: Belief solely inner information, get information geese in a row
Lee plans to check the NetSuite AI Connector Service — which helps Mannequin Context Protocol (MCP) and lets clients join their very own AI to NetSuite — to see how quicker entry to correct information can drive development.
By implementing an inner occasion, Lee is much less frightened about disruptive errors from LLMs skilled on public information sources.
"Take into consideration a generative AI chatbot. Whenever you ask a query, it may well mirror many views,” he explains. Alternatively, a chatbot skilled on personal enterprise programs advantages from “a clear information infrastructure.”
Lee is taking a methodical method: first get information pristine, then practice AI on domain-specific terminology, and at last see how inner AI can each discover the fitting info and automate downstream accounting processes to avoid wasting sources and speed up development.
Betting long-term on its authentic monetary core
From early development to main acquisitions that helped develop its footprint throughout the globe, DoorDash has relied on NetSuite as a constant basis for innovation and scale.
Lee credit NetSuite’s versatile structure and shut partnership with serving to allow DoorDash because it continued to scale and cement itself as a frontrunner in native commerce globally.
His mantra is straightforward: “Give attention to development as an alternative of churning by means of distributors.”
* Primarily based on the mixed numbers for DoorDash, Wolt, and Deliveroo, measured as of September 2025.
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