April 2008 Archives

 

The news as of the second cup of coffee this morning, and the music is the criminally underrated guitarist J.J. Cale, specifically the magnificent, wistfully haunting “Magnolia,” from the J.J. Cale Live album.

 

SugarCRM, a vendor of commercial open source customer relationship management (CRM) software, has announced a new reseller partnership with BT.

 

As part of this new alliance, BT, the British communications provider, will offer its 1.2 million business customers SugarCRM’s commercial software products.

 

SugarCRM offers a Web-based interaction management platform for “companies of all sizes in any industry,” according to company officials. Features include visibility into their sales pipeline, with deep reporting and forecasting features, as well as a closed loop between sales and marketing teams with marketing automation tools.

 

“We have looked across the market and developed this partnership,” said Bill Murphy, managing director at BT Business. “This partnership builds on the work we’ve done to date and allows us to deliver a tailored approach for customers.”

 

Added Murphy, “with this announcement we really are changing the way small and medium-sized businesses can think about and buy their business applications, delivering them the benefits of services previously available only to larger companies.”

 

BT will offer its customers “the full array” of SugarCRM software products. The offerings include Sugar Professional as well as Sugar Enterprise. Both of these software products are available as traditional On-Site deployments, or delivered over the Web via the software-as-a-service model.

 

“The combination of BT’s reach in the UK market and SugarCRM’s CRM products makes this “a perfect partnership for the UK market,” said John Roberts, CEO of SugarCRM.

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Wanted Technologies Corporation, a vendor of sales and market intelligence products for media companies, has announced that Michael Cunningham has joined its senior

management team as Vice President of Sales and Delivery.

 

In this role, Cunningham will be responsible for the sales and deployment of Wanted’s online recruitment business intelligence, sales leads and market analysis, according to Wanted officials. Wanted Sales Leads and Analytics are designed to help set business strategy and power sales productivity platforms.

 

“Mike has a strong record of executive sales management in larger established companies as well as in smaller high-growth firms,” said Bruce Murray, Wanted’s President and CEO, explaining the move. “His background with technology-enabled Internet companies makes him a great fit for Wanted.”

 

Prior to joining Wanted, Cunningham served as Vice President of Business Development and Field Operations for Peopleclick, a software company providing Talent Acquisition products for the Human Resources market. Earlier Cunningham founded and developed his own technology services company, focused on deploying Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platforms throughout corporate enterprise accounts.

   

Wanted delivers its proprietary data and analytics via data feeds directly into clients’ CRM systems, where it is integrated at the account level with other client information.

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After development, product building and testing, Creative Cruising, an Australian cruise wholesaler based in Sydney, is now live on Resco, reservation and CRM software from Rescompany.

 

As Creative Cruising represents various cruise lines from all around the world, the different currencies as well as the various cruise packages on offer needed to be combined in the system.

 

Ernie Skalsky, Managing Director and founder of Creative Cruising, said the Resco product lets Creative Cruising “control the costs and margins for each booking in the different currencies managed in the system,” and have the information at hand anytime.

 

“Further, we are able to streamline our reservations operation and greatly enhance the documentation, invoice and report handling for the company with Resco,” he said.

Peter Winqvist, Director of Rescompany Systems Australia, said their database shows the profitability and margins of the various cruises offered: “In addition, the advanced integrated CRM management tools allow users to create targeted marketing activities like direct mailings.”

Creative Cruising is the official Australian representative of Star Clippers, and represents a boatload of other cruise companies.

 

Rescompany Systems sells reservation and CRM software products to the travel and leisure industry.

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Diamond Sponsor of the Web 2.0 Expo, Etelos will “highlight new applications, new partners and new ideas as the themes” for helping businesses with online/offline workflow, according to company officials.

 

Etelos officials have announced new technology that enables what they call “true data ubiquity and application portability beyond simple online and offline synchronization.”

 

This technology is embodied in Etelos AOP Beta, and Etelos will be giving hands-on demonstrations of during the Expo. In addition, Etelos CRM, Etelos Projects and a suite of integrated applications running Etelos App Sync, which company officials say “enables any application distributed through the Etelos Marketplace to share data offline, online and anytime,” also will be shown during the Expo.

 

Etelos will host 20 companies from the United Kingdom at the Etelos booth as part of Web Mission 2008.

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CRM vendor NetSuite has announced a partnership with BT, to distribute, resell and support NetSuite in the UK and EMEA.

 

The BT/NetSuite announcement comes on the heels of NetSuite’s introduction of NetSuite OneWorld, a new on-demand product that enables multi-national companies to manage their company in a single application.

 

In 2004, the Department of Trade and Industry estimated that there are 4.3 million business enterprises in the UK and 99.9 percent were small to medium-sized enterprises, many of whom have requirements for multi-national CRM, ERP and ecommerce capabilities.

 

The majority of these, NetSuite officials say, “still buy separate, expensive software packages to run and manage their business.” Historically, the cost associated with running and integrating data from these incompatible systems is often high, they say, adding that “because of this application fragmentation, the software infrastructure used by many companies does not allow business processes to run efficiently across front and back office functions, nor across geographic boundaries.”

According to recent research by BT Business, client relationships are the most critical factor to the success of UK SMEs -- the research put it at “43 percent”.

 

NetSuite’s integrated business management software suites include one single system to manage business operations, which not only gives SMEs a CRM product but also a business management product that spans accounting, ERP and e-commerce.

 

 

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Hayes Carll’s Trouble In Mind, because I get too distracted listening to Todd Snider when I’m trying to write.

 

Oh hey, happy “Drive A Hummer Across Your Particular Patch of Earth Day.”

 

Customer Effective, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner and implementer of Microsoft Dynamics CRM, has been named the top reseller of Scribe Software for 2007.

 

Scribe Software provides data migration and integration software products for CRM implementations. Customer Effective was recognized for generating more revenue than any other Scribe partner in 2007 for Microsoft Dynamics CRM implementations.

 

As a reseller of Scribe Software, Customer Effective offers products that support business deployment options with Microsoft Dynamics CRM, on-premise, hosted and CRM Online. The Scribe software suite uses an open template model so customers can build integrations “without having to write a single line of code.” 

 

“Customer Effective played an integral role in the distribution of our integration tool, Scribe Insight, for many Microsoft Dynamics CRM customers,” said Lou Antonucci, director of sales for Scribe Software.

 

Scott Millwood, CEO of Customer Effective, said for many clients, data is disjointed across different departments: “Even small and medium-sized businesses struggle with data management across multiple systems. The beauty of CRM is the ability to infuse existing data, organize it into logical retrieval categories and use it to have more meaningful customer interactions.”

 

Scribe Software Corporation, founded in 1996, is a privately held corporation headquartered in Bedford, New Hampshire.

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Agent Image, the real estate technology division of The Design People and vendor of real estate Web sites, has announced the official launch of the AgentSuite 4.0 platform, described by company officials as “the newest release of its Web site management and Internet marketing system for real estate agents.”

 

This marks the company’s first major release of 2008 and the fourth generation of AgentSuite.

 

AgentSuite 4.0 provides “more than 100 on-demand CRM and CMS real estate products for property listings management, virtual tours, community pages, mortgage information, multiple listing service integration, statistics tracking, marketing and campaign management, site analytics, and real estate document storage,” according to company officials.

 

“We spent months listening to customers since the soft launch of the AgentSuite 4.0 platform back in December 2007. In April 2008, we reached a point where AgentSuite has truly become the enterprise-level system of choice for the power real estate agent,” said Tait Grove, The Design People Chief Technology Officer.

 

Representing more than $1 million in research and infrastructure investment, AgentSuite 4.0 offers a suite of scalable, on-demand features such as Web page editing, image uploads, lead management, custom design templates, dynamic page layouts, and customer relationship management for agents and brokers.

 

AgentSuite 4.0 allows agents and brokers to extend the database and build custom applications, Web pages and integrates with Internet marketing services.

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Jaduka, a vendor of Web-integrated communication technologies, has added audio conferencing to its Web Services application programming interface to improve its  spontaneous collaboration and productivity capabilities, the Jadukians say.

 

Users can automate “communication-dependent decision making” within their workflows, according to company officials.

 

According to Jack Rynes, president of Jaduka, the company “turned traditional conferencing on its head and thought of it as a programming tool. Now, when companies require cross-functional input to resolve critical operational issues, the event itself can trigger simultaneous out-dialing to the necessary team members.”

 

The new Jaduka Conferencing API can also be used to customize enterprise-specific features into traditional audio conferencing applications and create value-added services for existing intranet, CRM, and sales force automation tools, company officials say.

 

New conferencing methods include Online Moderator Controls that let users set up and manage conferences from a Web page in real-time. Other hooks are in place for monitoring call progress, recharging and adding minutes to an account, viewing call records and account history, and 24/7 reservation-less access.

 

By using standard HTTP and SOAP interfaces, Jaduka allows developers to program in several environments -- such as, Java, Perl, Visual Studio .NET or PHP — “thereby saving valuable development time and money.”

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Abacus Distribution System India officials say they have launched Abacus ClientBase, described as “a specialist product to assist travel agents to generate customer loyalty and manage customer relationships.” The product was launched in Mumbai.

 

Designed by travel trade insiders for the trade, Abacus officials say, ClientBase is a client relationship management tool “with extensive capabilities for managing customers.”

 

The product provides a range of functions to build relationships and deliver service to the travel agent’s customers. Addressing a gathering for the industry launch of Abacus ClientBase, Charmaine Ng, managing director, Abacus India said “CRM systems have gained success in many specialty industries that carry a huge profile of customer information, and with Abacus Clientbase the travel trade now has a breakthrough CRM tool for travel agencies.”

 

It “helps travel agents to assess travel patterns and preferences of customers, anticipate their needs and engage them through multiple touch points,” Ng added.

 

Travel agents in India welcome the launch, according to company officials. Ashok Lalchandani, managing director of Ashok Travels & Trade Corporation, Pune who has already adopted Abacus ClientBase, said the tool will let his company “take the next steps to differentiate our products and services from the competition with offers that resonate with our target customer groups.”

 

Abacus-connected travel agencies in India, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines and Sri Lanka can subscribe to the product.

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Cardiff, a division of Autonomy Corporation and vendor of Intelligent Document products, has announced that it has attained Gold Certified Partner status in the Microsoft Partner Program with a competency in Business Process and Integration.

 

As a Gold Certified Partner, Autonomy Cardiff officials say, the company has “demonstrated expertise with Microsoft technologies and proven ability to meet customers’ needs.” Microsoft Gold Certified Partners receive benefits including access, training and support.

“We are pleased to have attained Gold Certified Partner status in the Microsoft Partner Program,” said Mark Seamans, Cardiff’s CEO. “Cardiff has a close working relationship with Microsoft in the Business Process and Integration products market, giving us top-level access to Microsoft resources and support, including Microsoft’s exclusive Partner Knowledge Base and more.”

 

As one of the requirements for attaining Gold Certified Partner status, Autonomy Cardiff had to declare a Microsoft Competency, a set of requirements and benefits, formulated to represent the specific skills and services that partners bring to the technology industry.

 

The news as of the second cup of coffee this morning, and the music is The Horace Silver Quintet’s Song For My Father.

 

PacificNet has said it has signed an agreement to sell its entire interest in Epro Telecom, a telecom, call center, and CRM company in China, for $21 million Hong Kong dollars, or about $2.6 million United States dollars, of which the company has already received partial payment.

 

The company expects the sale to free up cash for its gambling operations.

 

Additionally, PacificNet said it expects to achieve minimum $30 million revenue for fiscal year 2008. The company also revealed the receipt of a non-compliance letter from the Nasdaq on April 16, owing to the delay in the filing of its Form 10-K for the period ended December 31, 2007. PacificNet officials say they company intends to file its 10-K annual report within one month.

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Etelos has announced new technology that enables what company officials call “true data ubiquity and application portability beyond simple online and offline synchronization.”

 

Any browser-based application from the Etelos Marketplace enabled with these new technologies can exchange data with any other AOP-enabled application, they say.

 

Etelos has filed multiple patent applications for technology that enables browser-based applications to function offline, reconcile changes made while offline, and synchronize data with any other AOP-enabled application when returning to the cloud.

 

In addition, Etelos AOP Beta is now available to users and developers.

 

“Etelos has created a platform-agnostic method for enabling truly distributed computing,” Etelos President & CEO Jeffrey L. Garon said. “It’s imperative that users have the freedom to choose the applications that will help them best build their business and run their lives.”

 

Regardless of the availability of an Internet connection, “this technology manages the potential conflicts between multiple users and their edits and allows for interaction between different applications,” Etelos officials say, adding that these patents are the basis of the technology behind the Etelos ecosystem, which includes the Etelos Application Server, Version 6.

 

The system for running a Web-based application offline is encompassed in Apps on a Plane, which enables any Web-based application distributed through the Etelos Marketplace to function offline, online and anytime. Etelos App Sync manages applications when synchronizing.

 

It all started with the idea that “for business users, you should be free to take your Web app anywhere. For developers, you should be comfortable knowing that enabling AOP requires no code changes to your app,” Etelos Founder & CTO Danny Kolke said.

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Extrapolating data from the January 2008 Forrester Research report titled “E-Mail Marketing Trends,” StrongMail, an on-premises e-mail marketing software firm, has deduced that the British public is annually inundated with 250 billion e-mails.

 

Forrester also found that a good 60 percent-plus of e-mails received by the British public are unrelated to work or personal life and are deleted before they are read. First Coffee wonders, of course, how the content is determined of an e-mail which is deleted before being read. But then again, First Coffee wonders many things.

 

These finding have prompted some in the industry to call for tighter self-regulation and control by the firms responsible for the unwanted e-mail, StrongMail officials say.

 

Paul Bates, UK managing director of StrongMail, says the scale of the problem is “costly for everyone. UK Marketing departments face bills of £100,000’s to send e-mails that are never read, while the public is wasting millions of hours trolling through and deleting them.”

 

The research found two-thirds of the British public delete most e-mails before reading them. For UK firms who’s marketing departments pay e-mail service providers on a “per message” basis, this is a costly exercise, StrongMail officials contend rather reasonably:

 

“In any other marketing discipline, such a low return on investment would lead to policy changes or revisions,” they say, yet e-mail marketing “continues to follow the same strategy, without looking at changes, such as using event-driven or transactional e-mails to create more personalized communications.”

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Major U.S. brands have incorporated mobile marketing into CRM as well as their traditional advertising campaigns and call centers in order to “increase response, enhance loyalty and improve customer relations,” according to the New Media Institute.

 

“Most people today use a cell phone. Lack of cell phone spam translates into a major channel of communications without the noise of traditional channels,” explained John Spagnuolo, President of the New Media Institute.

 

“The closer you connect with consumers within their lifestyle, the better your results will be,” noted Bob Gold, President of Gold Mobile, adding that in his opinion, when “properly executed,” mobile marketing can increase traditional response rates by five to 20 percent.”

 

The NMI is offering tips for mobile marketers, including the suggestion to “offer an incentive for individuals to opt-in to your mobile community,” and segmenting your message: “This is not a new concept for marketers, but mobile technology makes executing this task easy.”

 

To receive more mobile marketing tips, text mtips to 51684. To download the white paper, go to http://www.newmedia.org.

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Integrated Document Solutions has announced the launch of Referral Marketing Manager, described by company officials as a CRM-enabled tool designed to provide radiology practices “granular oversight of their report turn-around times and referral sources, ensuring that key business decisions are based on sound data.”

 

Born out of a desire to understand exactly when and why a radiology practice’s report turn-around times and referral volumes drop, IDS officials say, Referral Marketing Manager generates real-time graphs and reports that help IDS clients identify internal issues and validate performance with staff and clients.

 

“Human perception can be unreliable, but the data is indisputable,” said Yaniv Dagan, CEO of IDS. “The Referral Marketing Manager keeps everyone on their toes because of the level of transparency it provides.

 

As a result, practices can analyze report approval times, tabulate studies by referring physician, location, date, and generate trend reports, providing information to managers and principals.

 

In addition, the product includes a customer relationship management (CRM) component to help marketers and administrators manage their interactions with current and prospective referring physicians.

 

A contact manager and call scheduling module allows marketers to manage their daily call volumes and for administrators to confirm that regular follow-up efforts are being made.

 

Based in Ft. Lauderdale, Integrated Document Solutions is a privately-held technology products and services company providing workflow and forms management, speech automation, dictation-transcription, and productivity measurement tools for healthcare and general business.

 

 

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Nick Cave’s Dig!!! Lazarus Dig!!! Thanks to the Little Green Footballs blog for the heads-up. The video for this is rather eerie, in that Cave these days is a dead ringer for G. Gordon Liddy or a pre-hair transplant Dean Koontz.

 

Dubai-based LS2, an end-to-end information products provider and a Microsoft Dynamics Gold Partner for ERP Offerings, has announced its partnership with CodeTheatre from Bangalore, under which it will sell the MS Dynamics NAV products in the Gulf region.

 

CodeTheatre will be their “offshore development arm,” according to LS2 officials, adding that the practice launch has received support from the market, with customers signing up with LS2 to implement Dynamic NAV products “based on this global delivery model.”

Microsoft Dynamics NAV is an enterprise resource planning (ERP) product helping businesses adapt industry specific functionalities relevant to the local needs of the operation. LS2 has added this business management product to its current portfolio of Microsoft Dynamics products, which include GP, RMS and CRM.

Commenting on the developments, Arvind Agrawal, Managing Director, LS2 Corp, said the “new model in partnership with CodeTheatre” would bring “the best of both worlds to the market.”

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The Open Solutions Alliance, a nonprofit, vendor-neutral consortium described by its officials as “dedicated to driving interoperability and adoption of comprehensive open products,” has held its first annual board of director elections.

 

The OSA, which celebrated its one-year anniversary in February, filled three vacant board positions by electing Deb Woods, vice president of product marketing at Ingres; Josep Mitjà, chief operating officer at Openbravo; and Anthony Gold, vice president and general manager for the Open Source Business at Unisys.  

 

They join existing board members Michael Harvey, EVP and CMO at Concursive, and Dominic Sartorio, OSA President and Senior Director of Product Management at SpikeSource.

 

Sartorio said the OSA “will continue to capitalize on its strength of being a diverse, multilateral organization with a shared goal of better interoperability of open source point products and further adoption of open source in the enterprise.”

 

The board’s initial focus will be setting marketing priorities for the organization, specifically around new-member recruitment and best practices through the OSA’s flagship project, the Common Customer View, or CCV, which works across back-office and front-office applications to show customer interactions.

 

Prior to her time at Ingres Woods was Vice President of Product Management at Red Hat.

 

Mitjà was reelected to the board for a second term and was active last year in establishing a European chapter of the OSA. Gold is a 20-year veteran at Unisys where he leads the open source business.

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Nexedi, a vendor of open source ERP software, has announced the ERP5 Express Free service, described by company officials as “a completely free and unlimited hosted ERP product designed for small companies.”

 

ERP5 Express integrates in a single hosted product Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), CRM (Customer Relation Management) and Knowledge Management (KM), company officials say.

 

The ERP5 Express service is open for subscription to all companies in the world. As part of the beta launch campaign, the first 50 companies to subscribe to ERP5 Express Free will be provided extended online support “during one month.”

 

Jean-Paul Smets, CEO of Nexedi, said the ERP5 systems “have been already implemented for applications in central banking, aerospace industry and government.”

 

Yoshinori Okuji, CTO of Nexedi, said ERP5 Wizard technology is at the technical foundation of the ERP5 Express Free Hosting service. “Configuring an ERP is now a question of minutes rather than days or months,” Okuji said, adding that “this includes configuration of accounting plan, users, roles, and base data.”

 

Smets says Nexedi has “created ERP5 Express in a true open source spirit. It is free to use during an unlimited period of time and for unlimited number of users. User documentation available online is also free.”

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Microsoft Gulf is set to launch the new version of Dynamics CRM 4.0 in the Middle East during the first edition of the Dynamics CRM conference scheduled to be held in Dubai on April 23rd at the Emirates Towers.

 

The event will be attended by “an audience of regional business and technology professionals,” according to Tamer Elhamy, Business Solutions Manager, Microsoft Gulf. The event will feature executive speakers from Microsoft as well as partners who will share best practices on building and deploying industry specific products on Microsoft CRM platform for local clients.

The event is “an excellent opportunity for customers in the region to get an in-depth look at the power and flexibility of Microsoft Dynamics CRM,” Elhamy said.

Mr. Ghanem Dhaheri, head of IT at the Abu Dhabi Securities Market, said adopting “a state of the art contact center based on Microsoft CRM integrated with interactive intelligence” has increased efficiency in answering investor queries.

 

Microsoft Dynamics CRM currently has 14,000 customers and 625,000 users globally. CRM 4.0 is available in 25 languages including Arabic.

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According to company officials, Democratic Presidential candidate Barack Obama’s campaign is using RightNow Technologies’ CRM.

The Illinois senator’s campaign is using a RightNow e-mail response system for people with questions about the campaign, said Colin Jones, account executive at RightNow.

The Bozeman (Mont.) Daily Chronicle says the e-mail system helps the campaign respond to questions about how to volunteer and where Obama stands on issues, among other things, citing information provided by Jones.

“The system, developed in February 2007, just before Obama officially announced his run for the White House, also allows the campaign to ‘monitor trends in requests, such as location, requesting organizations, outcomes, etc.,’“ the Daily Chronicle reported, citing blogger Bill Ives.

Obama is the only candidate using any sort of CRM technology, according to industry magazine CRMBuyer. “There are other (CRM) products being used by other candidates,” Colin told the Daily Chronicle, but “those candidates have dropped out.”

 

First Coffee is not implying there’s a connection between candidates using CRM and watching their campaigns crater. First Coffee is saying, however, that Rudy Giuliani sure could’ve tried a lot harder than he did.

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NetSuite has announced that Virgin Money Australia, the financial services arm of Virgin Group, has switched from an outsourced product to NetSuite OneWorld.

 

NetSuite OneWorld provides Virgin Money with “one system to run its business operations more efficiently,” according to NetSuite officials.

Since May 2003, Virgin Money has been, in its own inimitable Bransonesque tones, “fighting to keep the big banks honest with home loans, superannuation and credit cards.”

 

By early 2007, the company was looking to shake off its outsourced business accounting software and bring the task in-house, Virgin Money officials say, and on a platform that could handle more of Virgin Money’s needs, plus its rapid growth: “The challenge was that if the company chose to manage the previous business accounting software in house, instead of having it outsourced, it would have required extra capital expenses for servers, storage, climate control and security measures.”

NetSuite “can be tailored to suit every role in our company, giving staff the information they need and the access rights we want them to have” said Andy Sampson, Financial Controller at Virgin Money.

 

 

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Coleman Hawkins’ Body and Soul album, the jazz album you want for party background if you want something “not too _____,” fill in the blank.

 

Endeavor Commerce, a Microsoft Certified ISV Partner since 2002 and makers of SmartCatalog, have announced their partnership with Statera, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner and National Systems Integrator Partner for Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

 

Statera will now provide prospective and current CRM customers with a Web-based selling engine to empower all selling channels and customers to quote and order fast and accurately.

 

Endeavor Commerce and Statera have begun marketing the combined product and are co-sponsoring “Get a Sneak Peak at CRM 4.0” events in Dallas & Denver. The Sneak Peak events will “demonstrate the both the benefit of CRM 4.0 as a customer-centric product where information is integrated across all systems then presented to information workers in role-specific contexts,” as well as SmartCatalog as an interactive selling suite, according to company officials.

 

“We are thrilled to a have Statera as a partner”, said Sean Myers, President and CEO of Endeavor Commerce, calling Statera a “strategic alliance for us given their strength in the Western US CRM market… we anticipate a long and successful partnership.”

 

Endeavor Commerce has recently released SmartCatalog Portal Edition, which company officials say offers out of the box capability to generate leads and extend Sales/Product Configuration and Guided Selling across sales channels via the Web.

 

Endeavor Commerce is scheduled to announce another major release of the SmartCatalog product in the next two weeks. SmartCatalog is currently featured at the CRM 4.0 Launch Across America Tour as a National Sponsor

 

Statera is a business and technology services and products provider headquartered in Englewood, Colorado.

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CRM and other technology products vendor Amdocs Limited has reported that for the quarter ended March 31, 2008, revenue was $774.3 million, an increase of 9.6 percent from last year’s second quarter.

 

Net income on a non-GAAP basis was $126.6 million, or $0.58 per diluted share (excluding acquisition-related costs, which include amortization of purchased intangible assets, and excluding equity-based compensation expense, net of related tax effects, of $26.8 million), compared to non-GAAP net income of $114.5 million, or $0.52 per diluted share, in the second quarter of fiscal 2007, excluding acquisition-related costs of $27.3 million.

 

The company’s GAAP net income was $99.9 million, or $0.46 per diluted share, compared to GAAP net income of $87.2 million, or $0.40 per diluted share, in the second quarter of fiscal 2007. Free cash flow for the quarter was $63.1 million, comprised of cash flow from operations of $97.3 million less $34.2 million in net capital expenditures and other.

 

Dov Baharav, chief executive officer of Amdocs Management Limited, said the company’s officials “recognize that there is uncertainty in the market as economic conditions have become more challenging and we believe that our forecasts for the second half of this fiscal year take this into account.”

 

In the second quarter Amdocs showed progress in the operational support systems area by winning a deal with a large North American service provider, according to company officials: “In Europe, Amdocs signed an important CRM deal with a large wireless carrier,” they said, noting “several wins with wireless carriers including a consulting engagement to help a service provider introduce offerings.”

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Always nice to hear about a company First Coffee never knew existed, and maybe you didn’t either, Mozes, which its officials describe as “an interactive mobile marketing service that enables marketing campaigns through mobile devices and the Web.”

 

Mozes officials say they have “1.3 million participants” now “interacting with their favorite bands through the Mozes network.” They cite statistics showing the desirability of reaching consumers via cell phone, pointing to a recent eMarketer study projecting that U.S. spending on mobile marketing will roughly double this year to $1.5 billion, and reach $4.4 billion by 2011.

 

Evidently the company helps marketers design campaigns to deliver messages on mobile phones. Since officially launching its service in March 2007, 1.3 million people have participated in a Mozes campaign with over 50 percent opting into a Mozes Mob — a mobile list — in order to receive text and voice messages from artists such as Avril Lavigne, Lloyd, Brooks and Dunn and Keyshia Cole.

 

“Reaching yet another milestone, more than one million voice message minutes -- personalized voice messages between bands and their fans -- have crossed the airwaves since Mozes added voice messaging as a service in October,” Mozes officials say.

 

Mozes’ on-demand, Web-based CRM platform is used for the text message and voice campaigns (IVR), which company officials say are “an increasingly important part of how companies, music bands, sports teams and other organizations communicate with their customers and fans.”

 

An example: During a recent tour, the band Rascal Flatts “saw more than 40,000 fans participate in Mozes-driven campaigns, thanks to text message and Web-based interactions that gave fans access to exclusive content and music,” Mozes officials say.

 

Founded in 2005, Mozes initially focused on the music industry, and company officials say it is now used by “over 3,000 major label and independent artists, including Chris Brown, Colbie Caillat, Daughtry, Nelly and Rascal Flatts.”

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OptimizeRx Corp. and Cegedim Dendrite have announced plans to enter into an exclusive relationship to offer a Web-based savings and patient support program for prescription and healthcare brands.

 

The partnership, which was announced at the DTC National Conference, “brings together two leaders in an emerging industry segment that aims to help patients begin and maintain their therapies,” according to Cegedim officials.

 

OptimizeRx gives patients a central way to access and enroll in over 150 savings and support programs. Cegedim Dendrite, through its Opus Health division, offers adjudicated patient support cards to the marketplace and now has more than 45 million money saving “loyalty” cards in circulation, distributed by physicians and pharmacies to patients.

 

Company officials say the partnership will allow existing Cegedim Dendrite customers to integrate a Web search tool into their marketing mix, while “getting consistent messaging and reporting across all marketing channels.”

 

Meanwhile, for healthcare brands without existing patient programs, the partnership supports the launch of OptimizeRx’s proprietary system, OffeRx, a turnkey product designed to integrate the development, promotion and management of customizable patient-offer programs.

 

Under the partnership, OPUS Health will manage the loyalty cards generated through OffeRx. To help administer the program, OPUS Health will use contracted relationships with more than 61,000 pharmacies.

 

David Harrell, CEO of OptimizeRx, noted that “right now, only a small number of pharmaceutical brands have implemented a savings and patient support program as part of their marketing efforts.”

 

 

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Johnny Cash’s gospel album, God. It’s a toss-up whether this or Willie Nelson’s country gospel album, Troublemaker is a better listen, maybe Nelson’s for including more old standards.

 

Zoho’s resident evangelist Raju Vegesna believes his company’s new enterprise CRM can hit Salesforce.com where it hurts — in affordability. “As with other Zoho applications, Zoho CRM is very affordable. The Personal Edition is free for three users; Professional Edition is $12 per user per month; and the Enterprise Edition is $25 per user per month,” he wrote recently. “The Professional and Enterprise Editions are also free for the first three users.”

 

Zoho has announced the enterprise-grade update of Zoho CRM, the company’s on-demand customer relationship management application. A video tour of Zoho CRM is available at http://www.viddler.com/raju/videos/21/. Or you can test drive the application at http://zoho.com/crm/online-demo.html.  

 

The latest version of Zoho CRM emphasizes enterprise-grade functionality, including role-based security administration, targeted to medium-sized enterprises with complex organizational hierarchies.

 

“The upgrades we’ve made to Zoho CRM have all been geared toward reinforcing its enterprise capabilities,” said Vegesna. “We want to give all of our customers, from one-person shops to small and medium businesses, affordable CRM.”

 

It is “a well-known fact” that Zoho CRM competes with Salesforce, Vegesna wrote, adding that the “unknown fact” is that the functionality of Zoho CRM is broader for Personal and Professional Editions — “available at a fraction of the cost. Salesforce spends nearly eight times on sales/marketing as it spends on R&D. Sounds to me a textbook definition of business model bloat.”

 

The Salesforce business model is “an evolutionary dead end,” Vegesna says, adding that “the proof is the silent popularity of Zoho CRM.”

 

Compared to Salesforce.com, yes, very silent indeed.

…

 

Infusionsoft, a vendor of eMarketing software for entrepreneurs, has announced the launch of its multi-city tour to “educate and share best practices with their customers.”

 

The tour, which kicks off during National Small Business Week in Orlando on April 23rd, is intended to bring together entrepreneurs to educate and share best practices in how to market and sell their products and services without having to increase staff.

 

Each half-day event “will provide attendees with strategy and real-world ideas for helping small businesses automatically capture and convert more leads and get repeat sales from customers,” according to Infusionsoft.

  

Tour dates and locations include…oh there’s a ton of them, hitting all the usual places from now to December. Check out www.emarketingrevolution.com for a place near you.

 

“The eMarketing Revolution tour marks the start of an exciting time for Infusionsoft,” said Clate Mask, President and CEO of Infusionsoft. “It takes a significant step toward reaching the masses of business owners.”

 

At the close of each event, attendees will receive free tools to implement into their businesses, including an “eMarketing acceleration kit,” personal marketing acceleration plan, Infusionsoft CEO Clate Mask’s new e-book, The Edge of Success: 9 Building Blocks to Double Your Sales, and real world case studies from Infusionsoft customers.

…

 

Zenoss, a vendor of commercial open source network, systems and applications management software, has announced that open source CRM vendor SugarCRM has deployed Zenoss for Service Providers to monitor and manage its end-to-end Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offering, including networks, servers, and end user application performance through synthetic transactions.

 

Lila Tretikov, CIO of SugarCRM, said, with Zenoss, “we’re able to monitor and manage our entire hosted service offering through a single product.”

 

Under its SaaS model, SugarCRM maintains instances of its application on networks and servers within ata centers. SugarCRM officials say they commit to high levels of application performance and uptime, and in order to meet its service level agreements, selected Zenoss as its enterprise IT management product.

 

Zenoss alerts SugarCRM IT management personnel of potential issues based upon performance trends or outages and helps them to isolate root causes via a consolidated event console. SugarCRM personnel then remediate issues.

…

 

Apatar, a vendor of open source data integration software, has announced the CDYNE Phone Verification connector for the Apatar Open Source Data Integration toolset.

 

The new connector determines the validity of any U.S. or Canadian phone number using CDYNE Web services, all without coding. Now Apatar lets users verify and filter customer phone numbers extracted from databases, files, applications (Salesforce.com, SugarCRM), and Web 2.0 destinations such as “Flickr, Amazon S3, RSS feeds,” the Apatarians say.

Over half of B2B marketers plan to put more resources against creating marketing databases, cleaning up customer data, improving sales force automation and CRM integration, according to Forrester Research in its “B2B CMO Investment Priorities for 2008” report.

The combination of contact data from many sources introduces “myriad opportunities for error,” Apatar officials say: “Because the records in each database were entered by different persons, each person may have introduced typos, placed data in an incorrect field or used different conventions for addresses, phone numbers, and abbreviations.”

 

“Data management is one of those thankless but necessary jobs. Data degrades, gets dirty, or become obsolete,” said William Chenoweth, VP Director of Marketing CDYNE Corporation.

…

 

Voxify has announced that it will provide speech applications in support of the Genesys “Intelligent Customer Front Door” products.

 

The integrated speech products will deliver what Voxify officials call “a virtual front door” for all incoming calls to “enhance the customer experience and deliver a consistent brand image,” by applying business logic to each transaction that considers caller identity, intent, preferences and call context to enable personalized interactions.

 

Genesys introduced the iCFD product framework in early April which uses Voxify’s self-service products. Already a provider of speech self-service to the Genesys Voice Platform, Voxify provides a suite of customer interaction applications integrated with the Genesys Dynamic Contact Center.

 

More than 74 percent of consumers surveyed said a great contact center experience has a major impact on their loyalty, according to a study cited by Voxify officials. However, many businesses today use technology to only deflect calls and contain costs, and these systems have frustrated their customers.

 

The iCFD is designed to use Genesys Voice Platform and Customer Interaction Management Platform, combined with a business rules engine and Voxify’s customer interaction applications and expertise.

 

The product, according to Voxify officials, is designed to help users discern the identity and intent of a caller in the fewest steps, gather relevant information from back-end data or workflow to understand the context of their call, determine how to treat callers based on established business rules and match the most relevant and available resource.

 

By David Sims

David at firstcoffee d*t biz

 

The news as of the second cup of coffee this morning, and the music is Warren Zevon's 1976 album titled Warren Zevon, his de facto debut.

 

Open Solutions has announced that Millington Savings Bank has selected the latest version of its relational core data processing platform, The Complete Banking Solution: DNA, to address enterprise-wide data processing needs.

 

Open Solutions sells enabling technologies for financial service providers throughout the United States, Canada and international markets.

 

Founded as Millington Building and Loan in 1911, Millington Savings Bank has $300 million in assets and four branches in Millington, New Jersey. The bank is migrating from Open Solutions' TotalPlus outsourced core data processing platform to The Complete Banking Solution: DNA and will continue to outsource via Open Solutions' Cherry Hill, N.J. location.

 

According to President and CEO of Millington Savings Bank, Gary Jolliffe, "Our history with Open Solutions was a vital factor for selecting their core platform. Our 27-year relationship made us confident of a safe and easy conversion from our existing system."

 

In addition to The Complete Banking Solution: DNA data processing platform, Millington Savings Bank will implement Open Solutions' Financial Accounting Suite (integrated financial management product) and Voice Response applications.

…

 

CMiC, a vendor of software products for the architectural, engineering and construction industry, has placed in the top spots in two recent industry surveys, beating out industrial competitors Meridian, Sage and JD Edwards.

 

CMiC won first place in the imaging and workflow product category and first place in the CRM product category. CMiC ranked second in collaboration software for general contractors and also placed second in accounting software.

CFMA's 2008 Technology Survey, a continuous sampling of IT patterns in the construction industry, found that CMiC provides the number one CRM product for General Contractors with over $250 million in revenue, winning over SageCRM and Oracle E-Business Suite.

 

The survey also ranked CMiC second in accounting software for General Contractors $101 million and above and second in project collaboration software for General Contractors in the same revenue range.

CMiC also jumped up four spots in the Project Management category from the CFMA's 2006 Technology Survey, a significant increase "that demonstrates that the industry is seeing the advantages in efficiency and productivity by integrating financials and project management," said Bassem Hamdy, Vice President, Solutions, CMiC.

In a study conducted by McGraw-Hill, the publishers of ENR and The Top 400 Contractor's List, CMiC took the top spot in the Imaging and Workflow category across all sub-categories. CMiC also scored highly in the Performance section, especially in security, scalability and reputation.

…

 

Kaleidico.com, vendors of lead management technology, have announced the release of SalesTwit.com, a "concept for working sales leads in any industry, in any language, and in any country," according to company officials.

 

By simply connecting your sales leads from any source — database, real time Internet leads, spreadsheet, or address book — someone can effectively work their leads no matter where they are by using any Web, desktop, mobile or wireless tool, Kaledico says, adding that SalesTwit has "effectively eliminated the need for a desktop application" by using Twitter, a social networking tool.

 

SalesTwit, company officials say, allows the user to input sales lead data and have it fed to them at a certain interval or even allowing the user to request a lead from wherever they may be: "Taking the function a step further, SalesTwit even lets the user create updates and notes on the specific lead, which internally adjusts the frequency at which they will see the lead in the future."

 

"The idea was to remove every barrier to working sales leads by making the interface simple and agile. Users can upload leads from any data source, in any industry, any language, and work them in the Twitter client of their choice," explains Bill Rice, CEO of Kaleidico.com, adding that "we have eliminated the need for CRM."

 

SalesTwit, which uses Twitter's messaging infrastructure for the distribution of lead alerts, allows the user to not only receive updates from friends, family, and connections, but also to intermittently feed leads to wherever they see their Twitter messages.

 

For example, someone who sells cars at a dealership can be on the lot, actively engaging new business or past clients, right from their mobile phone.

 

Kaleidico.com's Vice President of Business Development, Keith Burwell said SalesTwit users are going to be "real estate agents that are on the road most of the day but need to know when a real time lead comes in. They are going to be contractors on job sites who need to know when an Internet customer wants an estimate. This tool breaks down accessibility issues by using existing technology."

 

Rice said that by using tools such as Twitter and mobile phones, "things that are already commonplace in business, we are eliminating the need for someone to buy any more systems, CRM, or feature heavy applications."

 

Kaleidico has made SalesTwit a free mobile service, according to company officials, "ensuring that the prevailing expectation of lead providers is that their buyers will be in immediate contact with their leads."

…

 

CRM vendor Dovarri has announced that its President and CEO Geary Broadnax has been elected to the Board of Directors of the Virginia Tech Foundation. The Foundation manages all private gifts and endowments to the University.

 

Broadnax, who studied electrical engineering and photography at Virginia Tech, has founded three technology services and consulting companies:

 

In 1995, Allsource Inc.'s dramatic growth garnered it second place in the Houston 100, Houston's annual list of its fastest growing companies. In 1998, his second company, Insync Internet Services, followed suit, placing first as the fastest growing technology company and placing second overall.

 

Broadnax has twice been named finalist for Ernst & Young's Entrepreneur of the Year, and has also been awarded the Houston Small Business Association's Businessperson of the Year (1999).

 

He has served on numerous philanthropic and business boards, including the Better Business Bureau, the Houston Technology Center, the Houston Symphony, and the Houston International Festival.

 

"I am excited and honored to be appointed to the Board of Directors," said Broadnax, "Virginia Tech provided an excellent education to me, and this gives me the opportunity to direct funding to the significant programs that I believe helped me become successful."

 

Broadnax's current venture, Dovarri, sells Customer Relations Management and Sales Force Automation, provides services to a wide variety of business sectors.

 

Dovarri 7.0 Orizon presents intuitively designed, Web-based CRM/ SFA software. The SFA automates sales tasks, manages customer interactions, and analyzes sales forecasts and performance. Orizon's foundation, Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services, is a .Net platform that controls business information and manages documents over the Internet.

 

Building Dovarri's CRM/SFA on its foundation results in "simplified information sharing, increased efficiency in team collaborations, and improved personal productivity," Dovarri officials say.

 

The Virginia Tech Foundation, Inc. was established in 1948 to receive, manage, and disburse private gifts in support of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (popularly known as Virginia Tech) programs.

 

 

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is different versions of Warren Zevon’s “Lawyers, Guns and Money” First Coffee’s found on YouTube. Waddy Wachtel and Blondie Chaplin’s version as Joint Lawyers was pretty good, as was Jordan Zevon performing with The Wallflowers on David Letterman. Ol’ Warren’s solo acoustic version isn’t bad either:

 

Infusion Software, a vendor of eMarketing software, has announced the company has changed its name to Infusionsoft, and its Infusion CRM product has been rechristened Infusionsoft.

 

“Our new corporate identity represents a brand unification,” said Clate Mask, President and CEO of Infusionsoft, adding that “now is the right time to capitalize on Infusionsoft’s momentum.”

 

Infusionsoft offers an eMarketing tool “designed for entrepreneurs that enables them to convert more leads into customers automatically,” according to company officials, who say the “hands-free automation tools inside Infusionsoft that execute what would otherwise be complex, marketing sequences empower entrepreneurs to grow their businesses without having to grow staff.”

“Until now, small businesses have only had CRM, or separate, incompatible tools as the only option when it comes to marketing to new and existing customers,” said Mask. “We provide a way for the entrepreneur to grow his business by automating his marketing to prospects and customers.”

 

The company’s URL remains intact. Along with the name change, Infusionsoft has updated its corporate identity including changes to its Web site. The privately held, Inc 500 company, based in Gilbert, Arizona is funded by Mohr Davidow Ventures.

…

 

OpenSpan, whose officials call the firm the “enabler of the New Enterprise Desktop,” have announced that OpenSpan has joined the Oracle PartnerNetwork, a global business network of more than 19,500 companies.

 

Being a member “enhances OpenSpan’s ability to provide dynamic integration of Oracle Customer Relationship Management (CRM) with legacy applications,” OpenSpan officials say, adding that, at present, the OpenSpan Platform has been licensed for use with Oracle’s Siebel CRM applications on nearly 20,000 desktops.

 

The OpenSpan Platform is a software platform using “the interactions between applications and the underlying operating system,” company officials say, explaining that this “simplifies the integration process across both legacy and modern application platforms, including Web services.”

 

A number of enterprises are using the OpenSpan Platform to enhance integration of Siebel CRM with legacy applications, specifically to integrate data between Siebel CRM applications and “virtually any legacy application,” according to the firm, including Windows and other desktop-based applications, like Java, Host, Web, and DOS applications.

 

It can expose business process workflows that span Siebel CRM applications as Web services consumable within a SOA environment, and assist in the migration or upgrade of Siebel CRM applications, allowing an enterprise to use existing investments in legacy data and business logic as one upgrades or migrates to Siebel, company officials say.

…

 

Aspen Marketing Services, a privately held marketing services agency, has announced a partnership with Xtime, a vendor of service CRM and scheduling products for automotive dealerships.

 

Company officials believe Aspen’s existing multichannel automotive CRM capabilities, Identify! Plus and AppointNet, will be bolstered by Xtime’s Web-based platform to provide automotive dealers with call scheduling products.

 

“Aspen’s partnership with Xtime is a win-win for both parties and for the entire automotive dealership community,” said Patrick O’Rahilly, Chief Executive Officer of Aspen. “By integrating Xtime’s capabilities into Aspen’s current automotive CRM offerings, this new partnership provides dealers with the opportunity to make sure a customer’s telephone call never goes unanswered.”

 

The Aspen-Xtime partnership combines Aspen’s existing call handling and backstopping capabilities with Xtime’s scheduling and service management applications. The partnership will impact more than 500 automotive dealerships, including major dealer groups, such as Group 1 Automotive, and will bring the total number of dealerships Aspen services to more than 5,000 nationwide.

 

Founded in 1986, Aspen Marketing Services is headquartered in West Chicago, Illinois.

…

 

Maximizer Software, a vendor of CRM products for small to medium-sized businesses, has announced financial results for its first quarter ended February 29, 2008.

For the first quarter of 2008 the company’s total revenues increased 10 percent to $4.4 million compared to $4.0 million in the corresponding quarter of 2007. Operating expenses and cost of sales were $4.7 million compared to $4.1 million in the corresponding quarter of 2007.

 

Other expenses were $0.1 million, the same as the corresponding quarter of 2007. Net loss under generally accepted accounting principles was $300,000 compared to net loss of $200,000 in the corresponding quarter of 2007.

John Caputo, President, Maximizer Software, said the launch of their Entrepreneur Edition in February 2008 “completes our product line of Maximizer CRM 10 products.”

The Americas region recorded revenues of $2.8 million in the first quarter of 2008 compared to $2.4 million in the corresponding quarter of 2007. The EMEA region recorded revenues of $900,000 in the first quarter of 2008 compared to $1.1 million in the corresponding quarter of 2007.

The Americas region recorded net income of $100,000 in the first quarter of 2008, the same as the corresponding quarter of 2007, compared to the EMEA region’s net loss of $100,000 in the first quarter of 2008 compared to net income of a nominal amount in the corresponding quarter of 2007, and the Asia Pacific region’s net loss of $300,000 in the first quarter of 2008, consistent with the corresponding quarter of 2007.

“Maximizer Software’s accounts receivable increased as at February 29, 2008 compared to February 28, 2007,” due to the release of Maximizer CRM 10 in November 2007, said Kam Sandhu, Vice President Finance and Administration. “Working capital decreased during the same period due primarily to an increase in deferred revenue from the continuous growth in the company’s annual maintenance program.”

…

 

Concentrix, a British independent CRM specialist, has launched a range of Easy-Start CRM Packages featuring a choice of three CRM products — Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Sage CRM, and FrontRange’s GoldMine Premium Edition.

 

Peter Elgar, Concentrix Marketing Manager said because CRM systems help companies grow, “we get a lot of enquiries from smaller businesses looking for quick implementation of quality CRM software. Our Easy-Start CRM Packages offer rapid, affordable and comprehensive implementations of what, in our opinion, are the best CRM products available for SMEs.”

Unless the client has a particular product in mind, Concentrix officials say, they will carry out a free business assessment to determine the CRM software “most suited” to the customer’s requirements. They will then configure the software, install it on the customer’s premises, import data, train staff how to use the system and provide support and maintenance, and have it operational, in just one week.

Ian Dawkins, Managing Director of Concentrix, said “that’s a short space of time for a properly configured CRM system.”

If read off-site hit http://blog.tmcnet.com/telecom-crm/ for the fully-linked version. First Coffee accepts no sponsored content.

 

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Elton John’s underrated double live album with his smoking mid-70s band, Here and There:

 

CRM vendor Autonomy has introduced Autonomy Information Governance, what company officials describe as an “information governance platform that automates real-time policy management based on forming a conceptual and contextual understanding of all enterprise information.”

 

Autonomy’s capability is being marketed as a step towards “reducing risks inherent in information” by “applying policy based on understanding what an e-mail, document or phone recording says instead of relying solely on its metadata,” company officials say.

 

In the wake of the amended Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, sub-prime mortgage and credit crisis and highly publicized internal fraud cases, organizations are “under increased pressure to consistently implement information policies for finding, holding and disposing of information in a timely manner,” Autonomy officials say.

 

Most global 2000 organizations “have defined and updated their information management policies,” they say, adding that “the complexities of implementing and enforcing these policies is challenging even the world’s leading companies.”

 

“Most organizations are under the misconception that their current technologies are enough; that is until they’ve had one really bad experience,” said Browning Marean, Partner, DLA Piper US LLP.

 

Autonomy Information Governance provides an environment to visualize and control policy-driven information in the organization through “a vendor-neutral infrastructure using more than 400 out-of-the-box data repository connectors that allow management in place and retrieval of e-mail, documents, audio, or video information across the entire enterprise,” company officials say.

 

“Developments in the global regulatory and legal environment are compelling many corporations to start taking a unified approach to IT governance, IT compliance, and IT risk management,” said Vivian Tero, Research Manager, Compliance Infrastructure, IDC.

 

. . . .

 

Qurius has obtained what company officials call a “significant assignment” from Dutch consultancy firm Eiffel -- in 2008 Qurius will implement a complete Microsoft Dynamics based platform.

 

Qurius has defined the PSO sector as one of its key growth markets for the coming years. Eiffel is a Dutch professional services organization working in legal, finance and process advisory.

 

The business software platform will be implemented for 400 users in total and consists of Microsoft Dynamics AX, CRM and SharePoint complemented with Assistance PSO for Microsoft Dynamics and an HRM solution. Qurius and Eiffel expect the system to be fully operable by end of 2008.  

 

Fred Hermans, CEO of Qurius, called PSO “one of our industry priorities where we can create a lasting distinctive capacity… where we aim for significant growth in the coming years.”  

 

Qurius has more than 1,000 staff members. Its headquarters is in Zaltbommel, the Netherlands and it has offices in Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

 

. . . .

 

Fineos Corporation, a vendor of CRM and other products for insurance, bancassurance, and government, has announced that BT Insurance, a subsidiary of Westpac Banking Corporation in Australia, picked Fineos Claims to manage property & casualty lines.

 

Consumer credit claims for personal loan insurance and credit card repayment protection will also be managed by Fineos.

 

The software will be used to “streamline claims management operations at BT Insurance by automating processes, improving quality of customer service and enforcing best-practice rules,” according to BT Insurance officials.

 

Fineos officials say the company’s Claims product was selected in part for its “comprehensive case and claim management, integrated customer management and business process management capabilities,” describing traditional products as tending to “focus more narrowly on the claim rather than the claimant and the processes involved in managing the claim from start to finish.”

 

Michael Kelly, CEO of Fineos, called the deal “another strategic development for Fineos in the Australian market.”

 

BT Insurance Senior Manager Business Systems John Williams said Fineos Claims will “aid the customer experience by supporting the decision making capability of our claims team, improving our data quality and reducing processing times by automating claims management across the business.”

 

. . . .

 

Analysts at Tier1 Research report that since software as a service “can be a cost-effective delivery method for software functionality, it is rapidly gaining acceptance.” Nowhere has this adoption been more evident, they say, than in customer relationship management (CRM), which they describe as “a front-end customer-facing platform consisting of sales automation, marketing automation and customer service.”

 

While the on-premise enterprise CRM market has reached relative maturity and is expected to experience annualized growth of 6.2 percent through 2010, Tier 1 finds, the on-demand CRM market is expected to grow at a compound annual rate of 41.0 percent through 2010.

 

These findings are contained in a report released by New York-based T1R, whose officials describe it as “an independent research firm that analyzes the financial and industry implications of developments affecting public and private companies within the hosting, IT, communications and Internet sectors.”

 

“The global growth story for the on-demand CRM market is clearly an exciting one,” said Wesley Kennedy, Senior Analyst at T1R and author of the report. “And while the rising tide will lift all boats, it is evident that some boats will rise higher than others. Those companies that are levered to the fastest-growing sections of the market will clearly be the greatest beneficiaries.”

 

T1R analysts find that growth from European enterprises will be driven by the demand for point software applications as opposed to applications that can be integrated or are already integrated with other applications. Meanwhile, unlike the U.S. and Europe, many larger enterprises in Asia have not yet adopted a CRM platform -- either on-premise or on-demand.

 

“The on-demand value proposition will be much more compelling for larger organizations in Asia,” the report’s authors say, adding that as a result, analysts expect larger enterprises to lead the charge in terms of on-demand adoption, with smaller companies following suit 12-18 months later.

 

. . . .

 

California-based SkySuite is highlighting what company officials are calling “several useful new features and functionality” introduced in NetSuite Version 2008 Release 1.

For CRM, it’s auto-case closure notifications. For ERP, featuring work orders for assembly items; customer deposits balance and refunds; e-mail reports to groups; and employee level permissions. There’s also the option for a privately-hosted Web site. For CSV data import there’s support added for jobs and sales orders, and for Web services integration, support added for kit and assembly items.

“We research and test new NetSuite features before release,” says Skylar Wells, Chief Executive Officer of SkySuite. “We selectively recommend and implement new NetSuite features and functionality depending on the business process or use case.”

Based in Santa Monica, SkySuite was founded in 2000 and provides NetSuite professional services to small to enterprise companies around the world.

 

 

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Elton John’s underrated double live album with his smoking mid-70s band, Here and There:

 

CRM vendor Autonomy has introduced Autonomy Information Governance, what company officials describe as an “information governance platform that automates real-time policy management based on forming a conceptual and contextual understanding of all enterprise information.”

 

Autonomy’s capability is being marketed as a step towards “reducing risks inherent in information” by “applying policy based on understanding what an e-mail, document or phone recording says instead of relying solely on its metadata,” company officials say.

 

In the wake of the amended Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, sub-prime mortgage and credit crisis and highly publicized internal fraud cases, organizations are “under increased pressure to consistently implement information policies for finding, holding and disposing of information in a timely manner,” Autonomy officials say.

 

Most global 2000 organizations “have defined and updated their information management policies,” they say, adding that “the complexities of implementing and enforcing these policies is challenging even the world’s leading companies.”

 

“Most organizations are under the misconception that their current technologies are enough; that is until they’ve had one really bad experience,” said Browning Marean, Partner, DLA Piper US LLP.

 

Autonomy Information Governance provides an environment to visualize and control policy-driven information in the organization through “a vendor-neutral infrastructure using more than 400 out-of-the-box data repository connectors that allow management in place and retrieval of e-mail, documents, audio, or video information across the entire enterprise,” company officials say.

 

“Developments in the global regulatory and legal environment are compelling many corporations to start taking a unified approach to IT governance, IT compliance, and IT risk management,” said Vivian Tero, Research Manager, Compliance Infrastructure, IDC.

 

. . . .

 

Qurius has obtained what company officials call a “significant assignment” from Dutch consultancy firm Eiffel -- in 2008 Qurius will implement a complete Microsoft Dynamics based platform.

 

Qurius has defined the PSO sector as one of its key growth markets for the coming years. Eiffel is a Dutch professional services organization working in legal, finance and process advisory.

 

The business software platform will be implemented for 400 users in total and consists of Microsoft Dynamics AX, CRM and SharePoint complemented with Assistance PSO for Microsoft Dynamics and an HRM solution. Qurius and Eiffel expect the system to be fully operable by end of 2008.  

 

Fred Hermans, CEO of Qurius, called PSO “one of our industry priorities where we can create a lasting distinctive capacity… where we aim for significant growth in the coming years.”  

 

Qurius has more than 1,000 staff members. Its headquarters is in Zaltbommel, the Netherlands and it has offices in Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

 

. . . .

 

Fineos Corporation, a vendor of CRM and other products for insurance, bancassurance, and government, has announced that BT Insurance, a subsidiary of Westpac Banking Corporation in Australia, picked Fineos Claims to manage property & casualty lines.

 

Consumer credit claims for personal loan insurance and credit card repayment protection will also be managed by Fineos.

 

The software will be used to “streamline claims management operations at BT Insurance by automating processes, improving quality of customer service and enforcing best-practice rules,” according to BT Insurance officials.

 

Fineos officials say the company’s Claims product was selected in part for its “comprehensive case and claim management, integrated customer management and business process management capabilities,” describing traditional products as tending to “focus more narrowly on the claim rather than the claimant and the processes involved in managing the claim from start to finish.”

 

Michael Kelly, CEO of Fineos, called the deal “another strategic development for Fineos in the Australian market.”

 

BT Insurance Senior Manager Business Systems John Williams said Fineos Claims will “aid the customer experience by supporting the decision making capability of our claims team, improving our data quality and reducing processing times by automating claims management across the business.”

 

. . . .

 

Analysts at Tier1 Research report that since software as a service “can be a cost-effective delivery method for software functionality, it is rapidly gaining acceptance.” Nowhere has this adoption been more evident, they say, than in customer relationship management (CRM), which they describe as “a front-en