David Sims : First Coffee
David Sims
| CRM, ERP, Contact Center, Turkish Coffee and Astroichthiology:

August 2007

You are browsing the archive for August 2007.

Microsoft CRM from Biz IT Pro, Kintera and EZ Prints, AdvCRM, Opera Mobile Browser, Promero Disaster Recovery

August 31, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Veggie Tales' Boyz In the Sink:


Advanced Communications a software development company, has announced the official final release of Advanced CRM.

Advanced CRM version 2.0 features an online sales product integrated with live chat and ticketing. Among its features are a customizable customer management product, built-in live chat and ticketing modules, "dozens of features that are essential for online sales tasks," Advanced officials say.

The company has released this new version after using and testing it internally for many months -- "over 8 years of development experience," company officials say.

"A low price makes it easy for our customers to budget and purchase our CRM product, says Syed Nauman Hashmi, CEO of Advanced Communications. In addition to this, he says, unlike other CRM providers that mainly target large enterprises "AdvCRM has tailored its offering to fulfill the sales force and customer management needs of small and medium-sized enterprises (SME)."

AdvCRM is available both on monthly rental and one time fee. Customers may start with as low as $39.95/month for single domain license with unlimited users.

Advanced Communications, a software development company based in Los Angeles, specializes in hosting automation billing and VoIP products.










SugarCRM 5.0 Beta, SLM Buys VerticalFalls CRM, Creative Manager Pro, Endeavor SmartCatalog, Egyptian CiRM

August 30, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is The Kinks' scorching double live album One For the Road. Anyone who doubted whether The Kinks had the sack of a true rock band, and there are those who, 1964's "You Really Got Me" notwithstanding, have made this charge, alleging that Ray and the lads were a bit, well, twee, need only clamp on the headphones and turn this baby up, especially where they rip "You Really Got Me" back from Van Halen. We're a long, long way from Village Green here, folks:


Deer Park, New York-based SLM Holdings, a Web-based software provider, has announced its acquisition of selected assets of VerticalFalls Software, Inc., a producer and distributor of desktop-based software.

Located in Reston, Virginia, VerticalFalls has developed a Contact Relationship Manager (CRM) product for brokers in the financial services industry. The software is targeted at Registered Representatives and financial organizations that desire to incorporate the niche-specific tools into their business.

Under the agreement, SLM purchased assets of VerticalFalls, including all trademarks, trade names and copyrights to the name VerticalFalls Software. The consideration for such purchase involved both stock in SLM Holdings, Inc. as well as the assumption by SLM of certain debt currently owed VerticalFalls.

Under the terms of the agreement between the parties, VerticalFall's Chief Executive Officer, Jon Finkelstein, has also agreed to serve as SLM's Chief Operating Officer upon the execution of the agreement.

The VerticalFalls product provides the broker with a "comprehensive business management and compliance assurance tool," company officials say.








CRM from Microsoft for Bidvest, Axis and Sage, BearingPoint CRM for Costa Rica, Systine and Oracle, Pervasive and Salesforce.com

August 29, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Steve Taylor’s Meltdown:   The St. Louis-based small and mid-sized business technology vendor Axis Integrated Solutions, a Sage Software Premier Business Partner focusing on CRM and ERP for small and medium-sized businesses, has added a new office in Tulsa.   The firm was formed by the merger of three powerhouse regional independent Sage Premier Business Partners two years ago. According to one of Axis’s founding partners, St. Louis-based Kelly Hummel, Axis has just created a Tulsa-based joint venture technology products service company in cooperation with the Tulsa, Oklahoma-based CPA firm, Howerton, Morris, Simpson and Smith, PLLC.   Both Axis and HMS&S are Sage Business Partners. Under the direction of Ed Simpson, Axis’s new Tulsa office will continue to work closely with Sage Software’s portfolio of small and mid-sized business software products, with a special focus on Sage’s Accpac line of mid-market ERP software packages.

CRM from Pivotal and Saratoga, SystemLink in Tampa, Zantaz, Transcom Buys NuComm, Unisys Finds IT, CRM 'Consumerization'

August 28, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Suzanne Vega's "Tom's Diner," in honor of our opening e-mail…

We start the column this morning with a question which came in yesterday from "Andy:"

I have purchased and used a Starbucks' coffee mug for over six months...Usually, I am charged the grande price, less the 10 cents saving. However, sometimes I am charged the tall price for coffee, also less the 10 percent discount.

Now my question is how much should I be charged. The bottom of this steel Starbucks container claims it is 16 ounces. However, I have carefully measured its contents and only if you fill to the overflowing brim can you get 16 ounces into it.

It truly is handed to me with 13 ounces each morning by the wonderful employees who dispense it. 







CRM from CBIG for Higher Ed, Forrester CRM Best Practices, CDC Share Offering, Uni-Fi Alliance Formed, Microsoft CRM and Mole

August 27, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Mahalia Jackson’s Take My Hand, Precious Lord:   Niche CRM vendor Chicago Business Intelligence Group has announced that it is teaming up with Transforming Solutions, Inc., to launch a partnership to go after the higher education market.   The partnership will initially focus on assisting higher education institutions with “solving the challenges in the critical advancement and development functions,” CBIG officials say.   Both firms have experience in working within higher education and the Fortune 1000 in defining, building and implementing best practice business process and technology products. The partnership of CBIG and TSI provides a full range of services to the higher education market, including strategic planning, business and technology assessment, business analysis, requirements definition, process re-engineering, technology selection, project management, design, build and implementation.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Sage CRM Receives Diamond Award, Infusion on Inc. 500, BT’s Small Biz CRM, Caiman.com Comments

August 25, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Jim White’s Drill A Hole In That Substrate And Tell Me What You See:   BCG Systems has implemented Microsoft Dynamics GP for 5C Image Services, a division of Rentwear, Inc., a business uniform and apparel rental company.   5C Image Services provide both regional and national companies with apparel rental for their locations. 5C Image Services staff members do the research needed to partner with local apparel rental companies in each location to service the client. The company then provides centralized billing for every location’s rental needs.

Microsoft CRM for Law Firm, NetSuite and CyberSource, Cort and Salesforce.com, Convergys Charity

August 24, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Frank Sinatra’s Come Fly With Me album, the cover of which ol’ Frankie always hated because, as he said, it “looks like a United Airlines ad:”   Microsoft Dynamics CRM and CRM4Legal by Client Profiles Inc. have been chosen by Reed Smith LLP, one of the 20 largest law firms in the world, to provide CRM technologies and consultancy services.   The technology and services from Microsoft and Client Profiles are designed to “complement and enhance the firm’s ongoing commitment to advancing its reputation as a global leader in client service among law firms,” according to company officials.   Reed Smith has more than 1,500 lawyers in 21 offices in the United States, Europe and the Middle East. In 2007, Reed Smith was named to the BTI Client Service A-Team, ranking fourth among law firms in the United States for developing and maintaining superior client relationships, according to company officials.   Gregory Jordan, firmwide managing partner at Reed Smith and chairman of the senior management team and executive committee, said the firm is partnering with Microsoft and Client Profiles “on a firmwide, global CRM initiative to use technology to help us identify new opportunities for strengthening, broadening and deepening our existing client relationships. The technology will also enable the firm to streamline our methodology for integrating new attorneys that join laterally or through combinations with other firms.”   CRM4Legal for Microsoft Dynamics CRM is designed to provide the firm with a global, firmwide database that combines contact data, relationship information, client-matter specifics, practice group specialties, lawyer experience and competencies, opportunity management, client plans and analysis, as well as key financial information.   .

CRM Leaders to Stay Oracle and SAP, Epicor and Microsoft, ProStar CRM Dialer, eWinery and Joss, SpeechCycle

August 23, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is a Rolling Stones iTunes shuffle:   Independent market analyst Datamonitor has released a report titled Decision Matrix: Selecting a CRM Vendor, assessing the strengths and weaknesses of leading CRM vendors. The report, estimating that global enterprise spend on CRM application licenses will hit $6.6 billion by 2013, finds that Oracle and SAP will continue to rule the roost… and that of the two, Oracle is the market leader.   “Although the CRM applications market is very competitive and there are plenty of players who can challenge the current leaders in specific circumstances, only two vendors, Oracle and SAP, can be considered as market leaders,” says Vuk Trifkovi, technology analyst at Datamonitor and author of the report.

Datamonitor has developed a methodology they call “Decision Matrix,” billed as “helping businesses select vendors based on their technology strength, reputation among customers, and impact in the market,” according to company officials. Conclusions are “based on a quantitative assessment of end user sentiment, the capabilities of the business intelligence products on offer and technology features.”

According to Datamonitor, both Oracle and SAP provide complete products replete with functionality, integrate CRM with new communication technologies and offer full flexibility of deployment options, from conventional on-premise, through to variations of hosted and on-demand products.

Having augmented its CRM product line through the acquisition of Siebel and PeopleSoft, Datamonitor notes, Oracle now commands an “incredible” portfolio of CRM products. The report finds that, “if executed well, Oracle’s ambitious maintenance and development roadmap should ensure a market leadership position.”   Oracle’s CRM offering will be “improved both through incremental best-of-breed feature cross-fertilization and its ambitious project of re-engineering completely new product based on its Fusion platform,” says Trifkovi.

The report finds that Chordiant, Infor, and Salesforce.com all offer good products, but lack certain elements to compete consistently with the leading duo.







CRM from Centric and LoopFuse, Deacom ERP, IFS CRM, EntryPoint Hires Johnson, Customer Effective

August 22, 2007

  By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is the bagpipe-and-guitars Scotrock of The Crofters. How can you not love an album named Hold My Beer While I Kiss Your Girlfriend?   Okay, so when does the “one year wiser” part kick in? …   CentricCRM, a vendor of open source Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Content Management, and Enterprise 2.0 technologies, and LoopFuse, an enterprise-grade open source product for demand generation and closed-loop marketing, have integrated their software to provide users with the ability to track customers across digital channels, score sales leads, and measure ROI on corporate marketing initiatives.   LoopFuse was launched by two former JBoss and Red Hat developers in Spring 2007. The company has an open source product that allows organizations to track customer activity on Web sites and via e-mails, score sales leads based on detailed data about customer behavior and integrate marketing processes with major CRM products, including CentricCRM.   This, company officials say, enables LoopFuse to “provide the capability to score prospects for the sales team and measure ROI within marketing and sales activities.”   The integration of LoopFuse with CentricCRM is intended to allow corporate marketing departments to consolidate customer relationship history with online activity.

Blackbaud CRM, New Sage ACT!, Graham Ciboodle, VisionCRM for Microsoft CRM, Eloqua and AppEx

August 21, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is The Grass Roots album Temptation Eyes:   Sage Software has announced availability of the new ACT! by Sage 2008 product family including ACT! by Sage 2008 (10.0), ACT! by Sage Premium 2008 (10.0), and ACT!

CRM for FlamePro, SageCRM, Cardiff and Arrowhead, Synchronica and Sun, Saraya and SAP ERP and CRM, Product Support Hires Hibel

August 20, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Israel Kamakwiwo’ole’s Facing Future:   Integrated Tech, a vendor of end-to-end business software and CRM products for small and medium-sized companies, has announced that Namaste Solar Electric, Inc., has gone live with SageCRM.   The SageCRM product provides configurable workflow features, integration with Microsoft Outlook, sales automation tools, mobile device access and customer support functionality. Namaste added QuickBooks for a complete package. …   Cardiff, a division of Autonomy Corporation and vendor of intelligent document products, has announced that Arrowhead Credit Union has chosen Cardiff TeleForm to automate the processing of its hundreds and thousands of member and market research documents.   With more than 161,000 members and over one billion dollars in assets, Arrowhead was slowed by manual processes surrounding its paper-based market research and member satisfaction surveys. The cost of outsourcing services such as data entry proved prohibitive to the company.   With Cardiff, Arrowhead officials say, the company can now process twice the number of documents with superior accuracy, speed and efficiency.

CRM Farms, OCP and IBS Bookmaster, Sand/DNA for SAP BI, NCO Results, Serenic and Techno Brain

August 19, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Tom Waits’s Blue Valentines album:   Okay, now this is my kind of CRM, CRM Farms: Boise, Idaho-based Redneck Gifts and Hillbilly Creek have announced the gift basket to end all gift baskets, featuring Hunters Reserve’s wild game (venison, wild boar, and pheasant) summer sausage, Poorfish Dehydrated Water (think about that) and CRM Farms-supplied non-flatulent Chili Makin’s.   Hillbilly Creek plans on expanding the line of gourmet food products (!), by adding more of Daisy’s Old Time Confections homemade chocolates and candy. No word yet on the mayonnaise and ketchup sandwiches or Roadkill Helper.   Michelle Larsen, owner of Redneckgifts, along with IdahoGiftBaskets has been operating her gift baskets business since 2001. …   Oregon Catholic Press, a major publisher of liturgical music and worship resources, has signed an enterprise software and services agreement with IBS to install IBS Bookmaster software for CRM and other functionality for publishing and book distribution.   The new system will include inventory management, advanced warehouse management, CRM, financials, rebates and commissions, subscription management, royalty management, e-Commerce and book production.

IBM Lotus Expeditor, Soffront Software, Oracle’s Siebel CRM On Demand, ICentera, Convergys

August 17, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is something by Bach, the name of the piece escapes me, sounds like a typewriter — heck, all Bach does:   IBM has announced new technology designed to “arm professionals with the ability to combine information from different sources to create just-in-time applications” needed to “help close a big deal, deliver an important presentation or just get through the weather,” according to Big Blue officials.   Key to employee productivity, these situational applications, or mashups, blend Web services like news feeds, weather reports, maps or traffic conditions, with enterprise content and services from databases, spread sheets and documents.   IBM Lotus Expeditor 6.1.1 software is a standards-based managed client that can extend mashups in the enterprise to a wide variety of desktop, laptop, and mobile devices on the market, to give customers access to business information from mobile customer relationship management (CRM), among others.   Lotus Expeditor provides this mashup capability for Lotus Notes 8 and Domino 8, the newest version of IBM’s collaboration platform available to customers this month.   Company officials say enhanced security features give administrators control of the desktop, which means end users have role-based controlled access to the applications. Other features include a server-managed composite platform — spanning desktop and mobile — that integrates and aggregates applications and information, so using Lotus Expeditor software, developers can incorporate elements from disparate sources including Microsoft .NET, Swing, native, Eclipse-based components and Flash.

IBM Lotus Expeditor, Soffront Software, Oracle’s Siebel CRM On Demand, ICentera, Convergys

August 17, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is something by Bach, the name of the piece escapes me, sounds like a typewriter — heck, all Bach does:   IBM has announced new technology designed to “arm professionals with the ability to combine information from different sources to create just-in-time applications” needed to “help close a big deal, deliver an important presentation or just get through the weather,” according to Big Blue officials.   Key to employee productivity, these situational applications, or mashups, blend Web services like news feeds, weather reports, maps or traffic conditions, with enterprise content and services from databases, spread sheets and documents.   IBM Lotus Expeditor 6.1.1 software is a standards-based managed client that can extend mashups in the enterprise to a wide variety of desktop, laptop, and mobile devices on the market, to give customers access to business information from mobile customer relationship management (CRM), among others.   Lotus Expeditor provides this mashup capability for Lotus Notes 8 and Domino 8, the newest version of IBM’s collaboration platform available to customers this month.   Company officials say enhanced security features give administrators control of the desktop, which means end users have role-based controlled access to the applications. Other features include a server-managed composite platform — spanning desktop and mobile — that integrates and aggregates applications and information, so using Lotus Expeditor software, developers can incorporate elements from disparate sources including Microsoft .NET, Swing, native, Eclipse-based components and Flash.

GMP CMS 2.0 Available Soon, AppEx Certifies Conga Merge, Focus Softnet CRM 2.0, Relationals CRM at Gannett

August 15, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is the Dropkick Murphys’ The Gang’s All Here:   AppExtremes has announced AppExchange certification of Conga Merge, a product that “simplifies the production of content-rich documents and spreadsheets for printing or immediate distribution” via e-mail.   “Conga Merge lets our customers automate complex documents far beyond the reach of typical merge products,” said AppExtremes CTO Michael Markham. “By using multiple Salesforce reports, it can assemble data sets they can’t otherwise access, enabling template-based production of documents and spreadsheets now created manually.”   An integrated merge-to-e-mail option eliminates the usual save-to-disk, attach-to-e-mail steps, with parameters that pre-define e-mail templates and set recipient fields, enabling point-and-shoot production and distribution of complex quotes and proposals, executive briefs and account profiles.   The ability to use existing Salesforce administrator skills was a key objective in the design of the product, which requires minimal effort to configure for end users, company officials say: “The new capabilities build on the widespread adoption of Conga Merge for complex mass merge applications with master-detail relationships, such as summaries of open invoices, or pending orders.”   Conga Merge provides customers such features as merging from multiple objects and merge-to-Excel, which are “the kind of capabilities the AppExchange was created to nurture,” according to Salesforce.com officials.

SaaS to Hit $5.1 Billion in 2007, CRM from SPSS and MarketBridge, ERP from Epicor, Sage CRM Recognized

August 14, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is a continuation of the Alice Cooper and Jimmy Buffett iPod mix we tried out yesterday. Surprisingly it works well, if you stick to the Coop's early '70s albums, the Killer, School's Out and Billion Dollar Babies-era stuff, back when hard rock bands still knew how to write actual songs, and Buffett's mid-70s work, from Living and Dying in 3/4 Time to Son Of A Son Of A Sailor:



Worldwide total software revenue for software as a service (SaaS) within the enterprise software markets is projected to surpass $5.1 billion in 2007, a 21 percent increase from 2006 revenue, according to a recent study from Gartner.

The market is poised for strong growth through to 2011, when worldwide revenue will reach $11.5 billion, the tech research firm believes. And Gartner analysts say adoption of SaaS varies widely across software markets, contributing as little as 1 percent of total software revenue in some markets and over 75 percent in others.

In enterprise content management and search, SaaS adoption is in the range of 1 percent to 2 percent of total software spending. Within e-learning and Web conferencing, SaaS accounts for more than 60 percent and 70 percent of total market revenue.



"SaaS adoption is highest in applications that support simplified, common business processes or large, distributed virtual workforce teams," says Sharon Mertz, research director of Gartner.



Vettro 360, Xtime, Epicor Software, AMC Technology, Aspect Software and OpenSpan

August 13, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music in an iPod shuffle playlist of Jimmy Buffett and Alice Cooper. It works:   Vettro, a vendor of mobile on-demand business applications, has announced the sales staff of Travelex, a foreign exchange concern, is using mobile applications from Vettro with the BlackBerry from Research In Motion to enhance customer service through real-time business operations.   With Vettro 360 for Sales & CRM, Travelex synchronises its current Salesforce.com application with its existing BlackBerry smartphones. The Vettro implementation lets Travelex’s sales force access and react to real-time account information while on the road.   Financially successful foreign exchange services depend upon sales representatives increasing and sustaining the volume of transactions.

First Coffee Speaks With Talisma’s Brad Birnbaum

August 13, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Lenny Kravitz’s Lenny:   Today for your shot of java we have an interview with Talisma’s Brad Birnbaum, promoted this past March from Vice President of Product Development to Chief Technology Officer:   FC: Why did Talisma decide proactive service made sense now? BB: Our decision to add proactive service and sales to our company’s focus was the next logical strategic move for Talisma. We’ve offered proactive service capabilities to our customers in the past, but with CIM 8.0 we enhanced those capabilities and added new features to enable agents to not only improve support but to take advantage of sales opportunities. The main reason why we’ve done this is because of significant customer interest.   For example, proactive support is an agent sending a notification to a customer before the power is scheduled to go out. Proactive sales is an agent sending a customer a personalized product offer while monitoring the customer’s shopping behavior.   FC: What are some of the benefits Talisma CIM 8.0 offers?

Infor Educational Sessions, Kintera 2Q Results, Internet Fr Chooses SWoft, ReachForce Launches CRM App

August 10, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is good ol' Vincent Furnier:


CRM vendor Infor has announced it will deliver more than 35 educational sessions on customer relationship management (CRM) at the company's global annual user conference, Inforum 2007, to be held September 9-12 at Las Vegas' Sands Expo and Convention Center.

Infor, partners and CRM customers including AutoTrader.com and Interval International, among others, will present case studies and best practices for improving customer response to inbound and outbound marketing and sales campaigns.

Company officials say the common thread for these CRM leaders is their "ability to create a 360-degree view of the customer to achieve positive and profitable customer interactions."

Patric Timmermans, director of Infor CRM product marketing, said the company offers "big-picture views of how companies who implement advanced CRM products can drive revenue and build customer loyalty."

Several Infor CRM customers will present at Inforum, including Interval International who will discuss its best practices for inbound and outbound marketing.



Kintera, a vendor of software as a service to the nonprofit and government sectors, has reported financial results for its second quarter ended June 30, 2007. Revenue for the second quarter 2007 was $12.8 million, which is an increase of 12 percent compared to $11.4 million for the same period last year. Second quarter revenue exceeded the guidance provided during last quarter's financial results call.

On a GAAP basis, net loss for the quarter was $2.8 million, or $0.07 per diluted share, which, hey, isn't as bad as the quarter last year, which showed a net loss of $8.4 million, or $0.23 per diluted share.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, amortization, stock-based compensation expense and restructuring charges was a loss of $667,000 or $0.02 per share, in the second quarter of 2007, compared to a loss of $5.9 million, or $0.16 per share, in the second quarter of 2006.

This, friends, is an improvement of approximately 89 percent or $0.14 per share year-over-year.

Richard N. LaBarbera, Kintera CEO, said "we will continue to do what is best for Kintera clients, employees, shareholders, partners and community."

Operating expenses for the second quarter 2007 totaled $12.6 million.






















CRM Legend Pat Sullivan Explains What CRM for Small Biz Should Look Like

August 9, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is a song I can't get out of my hea:- Elvis Presley's "Long Black Limousines:"


Good news to pass on: it's been rumored that Paul Greenberg has been asked to do another edition of CRM at the Speed of Light. This is pretty well one of the few standard works on the subject, thanks to his publisher for realizing this and having Paul update it for what would be edition 4.0.

Today we have an interview with well-known CRM figure Pat Sullivan, founder and former CEO of ACT! and SalesLogix, who has recently joined the board of Infusion Software, whose CRM program is, according to Sullivan, "built specifically for small businesses -- which is really the last great opportunity in the CRM software market."

Sullivan is considered by some to be a pioneer and visionary in the sales automation industry and is attributed with creating the contact management software category. Sullivan most recently took public and sold ACT!




SAP CRM for Prudential, BakBone, Lebanese CRM Training, Open Solutions Alliance, Sage CRM and Harte-Hanks, E-Supply Link and ECI

August 8, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is From Elvis In Memphis:

SAP Asia Pacific Japan has announced that Prudential plc's Asian fund management arm has selected SAP to "improve operational efficiency and to better service their clients." The company will implement the SAP CRM product for 7,000 users across Asia.

SAP CRM, powered by SAP NetWeaver, will provide their fund management business in Asia with strong business process integration and master data management capabilities for what Prudential hopes will be a "360 degree view of the customer across all customer-serving channels in the company," SAP officials say.

The CRM product is designed to enable better communication and synergy among marketing, sales and customer service teams regardless of which channel they choose to interact with the company. In addition, implementing the product will provide the company with the capability to accurately forecast and monitor its business across the region in real-time.

"The right CRM software platform is critical to a company's ability to serve customers efficiently and have accurate insights into its business performance," said Eric MacDonald, President and CEO, SAP Southeast Asia.

Recently, SAP achieved leader status in Forrester Research's "Enterprise CRM Suites for Financial Services, Q1 2007" report.



The Center for Business Excellence of the RAK Free Trade Zone in Lebanon will organize a two day training course in Customer Relations Management (CRM) on August 15 and 16.

The course is "planned to enable companies to manage their relationships with customers," sponsoring officials say, adding that it will be "open for the registered companies, employees from the public and private sectors along with the individuals as the course is designed to suit various individual needs."

Oussama El Omari, the zone's CEO, emphasized the importance of the customer service courses, saying that it would "provide attendees with the skills needed to improve customer service," and was "planned to empower the participants in securing the highest level of customer satisfaction and designed to enable them to deliver better customer care."

El Omari said the scheduled training course will be delivered by "a professional expert" who will introduce the attendees to the customer relations management tactics and techniques "in a way to improve the relationship between the departments and their clients."



The Open Solutions Alliance, a nonprofit, vendor-neutral consortium, has announced the availability of its first interoperability prototype. The OSA's debut prototype includes specific standards and best practices for delivering a Common Customer View across open applications and is on display at LinuxWorld San Francisco.

The CCV prototype integrates data from diverse front-office, back-office and planning applications to present a complete view of customer activity and interactions. The CCV prototype is being built, tested and demonstrated with products from Adaptive Planning, Centric CRM, JasperSoft, Openbravo, Talend and Unisys.

"The OSA was formed this year to address interoperability among open solutions.



























IFS Goes Mining, KPN Teams with IBM, SAS at Office Depot, 5square into Auto Sales, and more

August 7, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is the Talking Heads album Remain In Light:   IFS, a global enterprise applications vendor, has announced that Hecla Mining Company has signed a contract to implement IFS Applications at its Coeur d’Alene, Idaho headquarters, with plans to expand the implementation to all domestic and international facilities.   Hecla Mining Company finds, extracts, and markets precious metals. The company primarily explores and develops mineral properties and mines and processes silver, gold, lead and zinc.   “At our headquarters, we had been using a legacy system that had been custom programmed in the 1970s and 1980s.

Promero ProStart CRM, StayinFront CRM 10, Hyfinity and Lagan, Saaspoint, BScaler 'Beyond CRM'

August 6, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Jimmy Buffett’s Living and Dying in 3/4 Time:   StayinFront, a vendor of enterprise-wide customer relationship management (CRM) products, has announced details of its flagship product’s newest version, StayinFront CRM 10.   Company officials say it “enables organizations to create the business model and application logic once,” and deploy the product “across multiple platforms, including LANs, WANs, Tablet PCs, and mobile devices.”   StayinFront’s advanced data replication and remote management technology lets users such as sales reps work with data even when they are not connected to a network.   New to StayinFront CRM 10 is an updated user interface with what company officials call a “fresh, contemporary appearance… which requires minimal training,” and is “optimized to make best use of device screens.”   A .NET framework-based application, StayinFront CRM 10 runs as a managed application using Microsoft’s Common Language Runtime. Visual Basic.NET is built into StayinFront CRM 10 for executing business application logic.   StayinFront CRM 10 is a “Smart Client” application, and is deployed across a WAN or the Internet using the “ClickOnce” deployment mechanism.

Jadu CRM, Fineos and IBM, Sage OnDemand in India, Strophe and Microsoft CRM, PBXpress, TriVium CRM

August 4, 2007

By David Sims David at firstcoffee d*t biz   The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is from the 1980 Dire Straits album, Making Movies:   The Alzheimer’s Society, a British care and research charity for people with dementia, and their families, has partnered with content management specialist, Jadu, to underpin the growth of its online infrastructure.   The first phase of the program includes moving the Alzheimer’s Society intranet to Jadu Intranet 2.0, creating a payments system for receiving donations online, and giving users the ability to find local services by integrating with a back-office database. The second phase of activity will tackle CRM integration and begin the process of rolling out local Web sites using Jadu Galaxies.

The charity provides services, information, guidance, and help through its network of 25,000 members across England, Wales, and Northern Ireland and won disability charity of the year at the 2007 Charity Awards in recognition of its campaign to drive the issue of dementia up the public and political agenda.

Salesforce.com's CRM Milestone, Aristocrat Gets CRM, Infusion Software, Omniture and Samsung, Access Commerce

August 3, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Lou Reed's Coney Island Baby:


Aristocrat Technologies Australia has announced it has concluded negotiation and execution of a Software Development and Distribution Agreement with Tech Results, a Las Vegas-based company specializing in Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Business Intelligence (BI) products for gambling companies.

The Agreement provides Aristocrat with a worldwide exclusive right for distribution of Tech Results products and "helps leapfrog Aristocrat's System 7000 Prime over their competition," Aristocrat officials say, adding that the deal "provides for combined development of some products to use Aristocrat's newest technologies as they become available to the market."

"We have been working together with them for some months in core markets like Australia and Macau, and have clearly seen the customer interest in the features their products add to our System 7000 Prime. The combined offering will be branded System 7000 Prime Enterprise," said Steve Parker, Group General Manager Sales, Marketing and R&D, Aristocrat.

Parker said Tech Results CRM and BI products have been running on Aristocrat Oasis in the gambling markets of North America for a number of years.

Lars Klander, President of Tech Results, said while the Macau market is "different, they too recognize the need for CRM and BI products as they continue to work towards maturity in the market."



The Tech Results family of applications includes products for comprehensive Customer Relationship Management, enterprise-wide Business Intelligence, promotions management, mobile player-interaction technology and more.

Ariel Blecher, President of Systems for Aristocrat, said customers will be able to use the CRM tools to "build a comprehensive, enterprise-wide view of their business, their customers, and their profitability."



On-demand CRM vendor Infusion Software has launched its newly designed and updated corporate Web site at www.infusionsoft.com. The site underwent a major makeover in response to "supporting company growth resulting in an online information center that better promotes the Infusion CRM products and services," and "offers more resources to small business marketers," according to company officials.

The new site will "change the way people read and share information on CRM and small business," company officials promise.

David Lee, Vice President of Marketing and Sales for Infusion Software, said a major change was adding Web 2.0 applications such as RSS for news and blogs to the site, which is "completely integrated with Infusion CRM."

The site provides a live knowledge base where customers and prospects have access to product information, industry best practices, white papers, marketing Webinars, training, case studies and a wealth of company information.



Business tech vendor Omniture has announced that Samsung USA, a vendor of semiconductor, telecommunication and digital media technology, has selected Omniture to "drive a personalized Web experience for online visitors," according to Omniture officials.

Samsung officials say the firm wants Web analytics technology to consolidate its CRM applications and help understand customer trends and behaviors, so the company can ensure the products and content promoted on their Web site address consumers' interests.

"Samsung has a vast product line and Omniture will allow us to understand consumer behavior associated with each product," said Kris Narayanan, director of integrated marketing at Samsung USA.
































Sage CRM Update, ACT! to Microsoft, Logix Gets ReckonUP CRM, Salesforce.com and Jitterbit, Software Advice, OpenMFG Now xTuple

August 2, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Cracker's Greenland:


Business software vendor Logix Microsystems has announced the acquisition of ReckonUp, a customer relationship management (CRM) product, from Prize Corporation for $4 million.

ReckonUp is a Web-based tool for automobile dealers to "improve operating efficiency and manage database of current and prospective clients," according to Logix officials.

"This acquisition will further accelerate our vision to become the leading provider to the $650 billion automotive dealership market," Logix Managing Director Sanjay Soni said in a communique to the Bombay Stock Exchange.

The company has acquired the assets related to the CRM product, which include the team, customer base and technology platform, for an all cash deal, Logix said.

Prize Corporation provides Web-based applications to automobile dealerships.



Sage has launched a customer relationship management (CRM) system, Sage 200, aimed at the small to medium enterprise market. David Pinches, Sage head of product management, said the product would be pitched to firms of over $100 million.

Industry observer Nick Booth writes that "whereas SAP is approaching the market from a high end enterprise level, Sage claims its product is more grounded.














ReachForce CRM, Jenny Craig and Oracle Siebel CRM, SAP ERP, Palladium, Satuit 10.6, Talisma and Cisco

August 1, 2007

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is George Jones...

Oracle has announced that Jenny Craig, the weight management company, has expanded its relationship with Oracle to standardize on Oracle's Siebel CRM to help increase business growth, improve overall efficiencies, gain a 360 degree client view across all sales channels and trim the fat from its operating expenses.

Using Siebel CRM, Jenny Craig will be able to automate business processes for sales, inventory, reporting, calendar and scheduling, company officials say.

Jenny Craig, based in Carlsbad, California, has about 650 centers in the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Puerto Rico. "We recognize knowledge and insight as the currency of influence among our clients," said Shoukry Tiab, Vice President of Information Services and CIO at Jenny Craig. "We chose Oracle's Siebel CRM for its flexibility and scalability. We will have visibility to forecast growth and revenue based on client preferences and seasonal campaigns."

With over 120,000 people signed up for the Jenny Craig Program every week, Siebel CRM will help Jenny Craig have a single client record through a Web-based system. As a result, they expect to realize ROI for the project cost within four years.

Jenny Craig also uses Oracle Database 10g, an Oracle-based data warehouse, Oracle Partner Portal, Siebel SmartScript and Oracle Business Intelligence Applications for a lean operation.



SAP AG has announced the availability of the second enhancement package for the SAP ERP application, developed with an eye to "minimizing disruption to ongoing operations," company officials say.













Featured Events