27 Jan Day 1 Highlights – Acumatica Summit 2026
Day 1 of Acumatica Summit 2026 set the tone for what’s shaping up to be a pivotal year for cloud ERP. From the opening keynote to product announcements and customer success stories, the first day in Seattle made one thing clear: Acumatica is moving decisively from innovation to execution.
With a strong focus on AI-driven intelligence, practical automation, and real-world business outcomes, Day 1 highlighted how Acumatica continues to evolve alongside its community. Leaders shared the platform’s strategic direction, customers demonstrated measurable results, and partners gained insight into where the ecosystem is headed next.
As thousands of customers, partners, and developers came together under one roof, the message was consistent throughout the day: the future of ERP isn’t just smarter technology, it’s technology that works the way modern businesses do.
Acumatica CEO John Case opened Day 1 by warmly welcoming attendees to sunny Seattle, highlighting the excitement of gathering in a new convention centre. His remarks set an upbeat tone for the summit, emphasising both the growth of the Acumatica community and the importance of coming together in a space designed to support collaboration, innovation, and connection throughout the week.
Looking back at 2025, Acumatica leadership reflected on a year defined by focus, momentum, and execution. The company concentrated on delivering practical innovation, advancing AI capabilities, strengthening core ERP functionality, and expanding industry-specific solutions, all while staying true to its customer-first philosophy. Rather than chasing trends, 2025 was about turning strategy into measurable value, deepening partner collaboration, and helping mid-market businesses operate with greater agility, resilience, and confidence in an increasingly complex environment.
Building on that momentum, Acumatica highlighted a clear shift toward a performance-driven focus across the organisation and its ecosystem. It was emphasised how performance today is not just about speed or efficiency, but about enabling teams to make better decisions, collaborate more effectively, and respond faster to change.
When teams are equipped with the right tools and access to reliable, real-time data, performance improves at every level, from frontline operations to executive strategy. Better visibility into financials, supply chains, and customer activity allows organisations to move from reactive problem-solving to proactive planning, while intuitive, intelligent systems reduce friction and free teams to focus on higher-value work.
As discussed on Day 1, performance is ultimately a people outcome. By combining modern cloud ERP with actionable insights and embedded intelligence, Acumatica aims to help organisations align teams, eliminate silos, and turn data into a competitive advantage that scales with the business.
John Case emphasised that the pace of change is accelerating faster than ever, opening the door to new possibilities, new ways to innovate, and entirely new approaches to growth. He noted that what was once considered “the future of ERP” is no longer something to wait for; it is already here, ready to be used by businesses today.
John Case also spoke about entering a new era of innovation and performance-driven growth, particularly in the face of ongoing economic and operational challenges. He highlighted how AI is becoming a powerful accelerator of innovation, enabling organisations to move faster, adapt more intelligently, and uncover opportunities that were previously out of reach.
At the same time, he made it clear that technology alone is not the answer. None of this progress, he said, is possible without people. True transformation happens where human insight meets intelligent technology, where ideas move beyond vision and become real, usable solutions that teams can apply in their everyday work.
John Case also reinforced Acumatica’s commitment to delivering the potential of tomorrow, today. Rather than asking customers to wait for what’s next, the company aims to put advanced tools, actionable intelligence, and performance-enhancing capabilities into their hands now, helping businesses drive meaningful results in the present, not just in the future.
Addressing small and mid-sized businesses directly, John Case reinforced Acumatica’s close alignment with the SMB community. He emphasised that Acumatica is one of them, a growing organisation navigating the same challenges around scale, complexity, and performance that its customers face every day. From managing growth to adopting the right tools at the right time, the company’s journey closely mirrors that of the businesses it serves.
John Case also highlighted that Acumatica uses its own technology internally, relying on the same platform and tools to support its operations and growth. This firsthand experience, he noted, helps ensure that product decisions are grounded in real-world needs, making the platform more practical, relevant, and effective for SMBs looking to scale with confidence.
With this continued focus on performance and real-world impact, Acumatica highlighted the rapid expansion of its community, growth driven entirely by and for small and mid-sized businesses. John Case emphasised that every investment the company makes is designed to support SMBs, because as customers grow and succeed, Acumatica grows alongside them.
That momentum is reflected in the scale of the platform today. In the past year alone, businesses running on Acumatica processed more than $500 billion in transactions, supported 60 million shipments, and engaged 280,000 daily users. The ecosystem also handled 10 billion API integration calls and delivered over 4 billion application page views, underscoring both the reliability and reach of the platform as it continues to scale with its customers.
Acumatica made it clear that this scale and momentum are possible only because of the success of the businesses that run on the platform. Without the growth, resilience, and performance of its customers, none of these achievements would exist. Acumatica not only supports its success but also drives the platform forward, reinforcing the company’s commitment to building technology that grows alongside the businesses it serves.
During the keynote, John Case also introduced a video featuring testimonials from senior leaders across multiple companies, who shared how Acumatica has supported their growth journeys. In the video, executives described how the platform helped them streamline operations, automate critical processes, and gain better visibility across their businesses, enabling them to scale more efficiently while maintaining control and agility as complexity increased.
The testimonials highlighted concrete results that Acumatica customers have achieved. Some companies reported 10x revenue growth over seven years, while others scaled operations by 100–300% within a single year. Improvements in operational efficiency were equally impressive: lead times were reduced by 75%, data processing times dropped 50–300%, and order processing speed increased by 300%. On-time delivery improved by 50%, while inventory carrying costs fell 15–25%, demonstrating how the platform’s automation and data-driven tools directly translate into measurable business performance.
Sanket Akerkar, President and COO of Acumatica, explained that the platform is being developed to serve as a digital replica of your business, a true “digital twin.” He described it as a complete digital version of a company’s physical operations, where all the different elements of a business are combined, represented, and interconnected within the model. This digital twin captures not just individual processes, but how every part of the organisation relates to and impacts the others, giving businesses real-time insight and the ability to optimise, automate, and grow with precision.
Sanket Akerkar also highlighted that Acumatica doesn’t just capture data; it tells the real story of how business outcomes were achieved. By consolidating and connecting all elements of operations, the system allows organisations to deeply understand not only what happened but why it happened. He emphasised that, empowered by best-in-class cloud ERP software, businesses are no longer limited to analysing the past. Instead, they can explore the best ways to optimise performance and even predict future outcomes, giving teams the insight and confidence to make proactive, data-driven decisions.
Sanket Akerkar described Acumatica as a system of intelligence and a single source of truth, a foundation designed to drive the next level of control, growth, and operational excellence. He emphasised that the platform gives businesses the power to achieve superior results, while recognising that not all customers are the same. To address this, Acumatica continues to build and enhance industry editions, ensuring that the platform meets the specific needs and regulatory requirements of different sectors, from manufacturing and distribution to services and retail.
Debbie Baldwin emphasised that every business starts with the expectation of making a profit, but in reality, things rarely go exactly as planned. At each stage of operations, unexpected challenges can erode margins, outdated machinery can increase production costs, or delivery expenses may be higher than anticipated. She highlighted that with a robust ERP system like Acumatica, businesses can track every step of the process, identify where inefficiencies occur, and pinpoint exactly where optimisation is needed to protect profits and improve operational performance.
Acumatica also recognised outstanding customer achievements at the summit. Customer of the Year was awarded to Storm Smart, celebrated for its rapid growth, multi-branch scaling, and successful transition from a legacy homegrown system to Acumatica’s cloud ERP.
The Impact Customer of the Year award went to PSI Family Services, acknowledged for modernising operations, managing thousands of claims efficiently, and improving both flexibility and visibility across their organisation. These awards highlighted how Acumatica customers are leveraging the platform to drive measurable business outcomes and scale with confidence.
Miten Mehta, Chief Engineering Officer at Acumatica, demonstrated Acumatica AI Studio in action, showing how the platform empowers users to get fast, contextual data and insights using descriptive, natural‑language requests directly within the ERP. He walked through how teams can leverage a mix of ready‑made prompts and custom prompts tailored to their specific departmental needs, whether in finance, operations, sales, or support, all without leaving the Acumatica interface. AI Studio is a low‑code/no‑code environment that lets business users design and deploy AI‑driven workflows and automations, turning natural language queries into meaningful results such as automated record updates, summaries, recommendations, or anomaly detection. The tool integrates with various large language models and can bring insights and task automation into everyday ERP screens, making it easier to streamline routine work, enhance data visibility, and amplify decision‑making across the organisation.
John Case emphasised the core focus of Acumatica: “building the future of business together.” He noted that this phrase not only defines the company’s mission but also serves as a guiding principle for its employees, driving innovation, collaboration, and a shared commitment to helping customers achieve growth, efficiency, and operational excellence. It reflects the belief that success is created in partnership, between Acumatica, its customers, and its broader ecosystem.
John Case highlighted that none of this would be possible without the Acumatica community, partners, clients, developers, and users, whose engagement, feedback, and collaboration are at the heart of the platform’s success and continued evolution.
