By David Sims
[email protected]

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and since we have a Dutch family staying with us for a couple days we wish them and you a happy Sint-Nicolaas Day, where the music is the Barenaked Ladies' great third-grade version of "Jingle Bells:"

MySQL AB, an open-source database developer, has announced that Tellme Networks, Inc. is, in MySQL AB's officials' words, "benefiting from significantly reduced database-related costs by using the open source MySQL database."  Tellme employs MySQL to power enterprise and carrier applications on what company officials say is "the world's largest open platform for the phone."

"The MySQL server is a core technology in our distributed data cluster that handles over 2 terabytes of data per week," said Rick Levenson, senior vice president of Service Delivery at Tellme. "By using MySQL, we have been able to reduce our costs while maintaining high availability across our client applications."

Tellme powers voice-based phone searches used by more than 35 million people every month. Its data load has scaled with the rapid growth in its traffic, from 500 million calls in 2004 to nearly 2 billion calls in 2006.

Tellme officials say the company relies on MySQL as a core technology in its distributed data cluster -- "in addition to handling more than 2.25 terabytes per week, this system processes logging data, performance tuning data, recognition statistics and billing."

The company also uses MySQL as a fast, highly available data store for applications because "this system is geographically redundant and can provide personalization data in milliseconds." Tellme also uses MySQL as a general data warehouse to reduce costs for several of its innovative business efforts. The company runs MySQL on a heterogeneous network of hardware.
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Sedona Corporation, a vendor of MRM -- Member Relationship Management -- for small and mid-size financial services organizations, has announced that Municipal Employees Credit Union of Oklahoma City has selected Sedona's Intarsia as its MRM application.

With assets over $80 million, Municipal Employees Credit Union has been assisting over 10,000 members in the Oklahoma City metro area.

Municipal Employees Credit Union, who will be converting to Sharetec systems in July 2007, found that both the technology and services offered by Sedona were acceptable for its needs. Intarsia's capabilities for the credit union market and its out-of-box integration with Municipal Employees Credit Union's core processing system will help Municipal Employees Credit Union to be more effective in cross selling and overall member relationship management, company officials hope.

Intarsia is designed and priced for small and midsize financial services businesses and can be tailored for each organization. The software includes features such as cross-sell and next best product and services recommendation, customer retention prediction, contribution/profit management, process management, contact and referral management and campaign management.
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Oncontact Software, a vendor of .NET based customer relationship management (CRM) software systems for the mid-market, and WorkWise, Inc, a vendor of information management products, have announced a long-term OEM relationship for Oncontact's .NET CRM products.

Under the terms of the agreement WorkWise will make Oncontact Software's Oncontact V line of CRM products as the exclusive CRM system for its existing and prospective client base. WorkWise currently has over 500 client companies world wide. WorkWise will market Oncontact's CRM system as TCM CRM under a private label OEM agreement.

Oncontact Software was chosen by WorkWise after a search of the CRM marketplace to find a CRM system built for the Microsoft .NET environment.

Harry Mosesian, director of sales and business development for WorkWise, Inc. said the addition of the TCM CRM component to their enterprise offerings for manufacturers, "rounds out a complete product for our clients."

Oncontact Software develops .NET CRM software for mid-market companies. Oncontact V is a 100 percent Microsoft .NET based CRM applications suite that automates the sales, marketing and service areas of mid-market organizations. It's a privately held company with a presence throughout North America, South America, Europe, Asia/Pacific and the Middle East with corporate headquarters in Wisconsin.
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FYI:

Extraprise, a B2B database marketing services and CRM systems integration provider, has announced that it has made available its "Achieving Closed-Loop B2B Marketing" white paper, the first available for B2B database marketers.

The Extraprise white paper addresses the history of Customer Relationship Management, its impact on database marketing practices and how to solve lead and customer management issues.

"Extraprise believes that closed-loop marketing is a reality as long as companies recognize the importance of integration between CRM and database marketing," said William Blundon, EVP of Extraprise Product Development and Support and white paper author. "However, without a serious makeover, database marketing has the potential to render itself irrelevant. If the marketing database can't prove and measure its own worth through to the sales and service channels, it will be viewed as just another marketing investment gone wrong."

White paper topics include what do CRM and database marketing have to do with one another, what does "closed-loop marketing" really mean and addresses data, privacy and security concerns.

A free copy of the white paper can be downloaded directly from www.extraprise.com or from Lou Orfanos, Director of Marketing for Extraprise at [email protected].
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And in case you're interested: In Las Vegas SAP's senior executives on Monday said they want to lay out the next three to four years of their architecture in "a more iterative fashion," to allow customers a "gentle, not jarring" upgrade path, Canadian Technology News reports.

During a keynote address that opened SAP AG's annual analyst conference, CEO Henning Kagermann said it's "not a big bang like we tried to have in 2000. It's coming to a more natural way that is not as big a disruption to businesses."

According to CTN, Kagermann said that customers will be able to build on the mySAP ERP 2005 platform without fear of obsolescence. "Based on a services-oriented architecture approach, the company plans to release add-ons over the next few years that will improve that platform but won't require a deep investment," the trade journal said.

SAP announced the first of its enhancement packages for mySAP ERP on Monday with improvements in human capital management, financials, adaptive manufacturing and, for retail customers, demand management and point-of-sale integration.

"The question is, are you going to go faster than other (businesses) and create a culture of change in your organization?" said Kagermann.

By adopting a more staggered approach to upgrades, CTN said, Kagermann predicted that SAP customers can remove about 50 per cent of their existing upgrade costs.
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You know, the more I think about it, the more I think you should probably put Bob and Doug McKenzie's version of "Twelve Days of Christmas" on your Christmas CD, and leave the Cheech and Chong "Santa Claus and His Old Lady." But throw C&C's "Evelyn Woodhead Speed Reading Course" ad on somewhere.

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