New Report Predicts Technology Spending at Banks to Increase

According to a report published by Celent Communications, banks in the United States plan to increase information technology spending this year by an average of 4%. Celent also predicts the banks will spend over $34 billion on technology in 2002.

Despite the current recession, banks are increasing their spending because of the overall decline in the number of banks and competitive pressures from non-banks.

"Banks have continued to increase their IT budgets, even while many other industries are holding back. In part, banks have little choice in this -- a very large proportion of their spending is on maintaining existing infrastructure." said Octavio Marenzi, managing director at Celent. "Banks are also increasingly viewing technology as a competitive differentiator, as a tool with which to wrest market share from their competition."

Consolidation of the banking industry drives increased spending on technology because large banks do not only spend more on information technology than smaller institutions, they spend a greater percentage of the overall budget on it. The largest commercial banks spend as much as 25% of their total expenses on technology.

According to the report, Citigroup has allocated $5.1 billion for technology this year, J.P. Morgan Chase, $4.7 billion, Bank of America, $3.3 billion, Wells Fargo, $2 billion, Bank One Corp, $1.9 billion, Wachovia, $1.1 billion and FleetBoston  $900 million.

Since some of these institutions are among Siebel System's biggest clients, its no wonder Tom Siebel thinks the recession has ended.     

The Siebel Observer Summit
April 3rd - 6th, 2002

The Siebel Observer will hold its second annual Siebel Observer Summit at the Vail Cascade Club from April 3rd through the 5th.  

"This summit is a rare opportunity for attendees to discuss major issues affecting their business with their colleagues from other important companies," said J. Bruce Daley, executive editor of The Siebel Observer.   "Last year's participants told us that they couldn't think of a more enjoyable way to form new business relationships than skiing together in one of the best resorts in the world," he continued.

This invitation only conference will cover a variety of topics, including what CIOs are looking for in 2002, industry trends and forecasts, alternative marketing strategies, and how to evaluate opportunities to partner, buy, or to merge with other companies.

Some of the companies attending last year's conference include Accenture, Answerthink, Berkeley Enterprise Partners, Braun Consulting, Deloitte Consulting, Experio, Freemarkets, Horowitz Group, Inforte, J.D. Edwards, Mitem, Siebel Systems, and Xansa.     

Answerthink Forms Joint Venture with HCL Technologies to Offer Customers Offshore Development

Answerthink (Nasdaq: ANSR) has formed a joint venture with HCL Technologies (Bombay:HCLT.BO), one of India's top five IT services firms, to provide companies with cost-competitive offshore development services. The new company will be called HCL-Answerthink. With access to facilities in India, HCL-Answerthink will offer custom application development, on-going production support, and application maintenance services. Ken Coppins, Answerthink's Chief Risk Management Officer, will become CEO of HCL-Answerthink.

"This joint venture allows us to immediately offer our clients application maintenance and off-shore centric custom development solutions -- two very large and growing service areas," said Ted A. Fernandez, Chairman and CEO of Answerthink.

Shiv Nadar, Chairman, President and CEO of HCL Technologies said, "I see the HCL Technologies and Answerthink alliance as extremely synergistic. Answerthink is a valuable partner to several global 2000 companies, having delivered both business management and technology integration services to them."

The joint venture allows Answerthink to expand its business model by combining its knowledge of business transformation, business applications and technology integration with the technical expertise developed in HCL Technologies' 16 offshore facilities.

"I think this is the shape of things to come," said Ashish Nanda, Associate Professor at Harvard Business School. "A growing number of consulting companies that have front end client relationships and market presence will enter alliances with reliable, low cost back-end delivery organizations available off -shore, particularly in India. India is in the sweet spot right now because the price advantage of software delivery is high and concern over quality is low."

Founded in 1997, Answerthink has more than 1,300 employees and offices in 17 cities throughout the United States and in Europe. Founded in 1991, HCL Technologies numbers over 4,300 employees, with operations spanning 25 locations in 15 countries. For more information about the venture contact Ken Coppins at kcoppins@answerthink.com.     

Aspective Bucks Industry Trend

Despite difficult economic times, U.K. based Aspective has bucked the industry trend and exceeded its 2001 financial goals.

The privately held managed application provider and consulting company reported revenue in 2001 of $30.9 million (EUR27). The company also achieved profitability in the fourth quarter six months ahead of expectations.

Aspective is in a strong position to move forward," said Javaid Aziz, CEO, Aspective.   "We will continue to strategically develop the business and build our client base of blue-chip companies."

In 2001 the firm added new customers such as Irish Life, Heineken, Pirelli and The Law Society.  Aspective also contributed to the advance of wireless technology in 2001 delivering the first Siebel Wireless and Lotus Domino over mm02's (previously BT Cellnet) GPRS network, providing 'always on, always connected' access for users.

"They come from a heritage as a consulting company," said Nicole France, Senior Analyst at Gartner Group. "From the beginning Apective had a strong understanding of enterprise applications. They have an experienced management team who has recruited experienced staff.   This is really a major fact in their favor."

Aspective specializes in applications for sales, marketing and customer service and employs over 200 people across Europe. It is organized into three divisions - Consultancy and Implementation Services, Managed Services and Mobile Enterprise Solutions. For 2002, the focus will continue to be on the financial services, life sciences and health care industries, as well as on the government sector.       

Profile: Apex IT

Apex IT, a consulting services firm focused exclusively on customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise integration, has joined the Alliance program as a Consulting Partner.

"We feel confident in our ability to play in the game," said Scott Newton. "Apex IT has deep experience in CRM projects starting with some of the pioneers in the industry. A few years ago we came to the point where we wanted to diversify our offering and signed up for the Alliance program. Rather than announce our entry into the market then, we decided to wait and complete some projects successfully. We have been doing Siebel work now for over a year and half."

One of those projects has been to launch a Help Desk pilot program at SPSS Inc. SPSS selected Apex IT in the fall of 2001 to implement Siebel 7.

"While familiarity with Apex IT was certainly a factor, we did our homework thoroughly before making a final choice. Apex IT's strong CRM consulting bench and focus on our business goals were key to our decision-making process," said Jon Otterstatter, EVP and CTO for SPSS Inc.

Apex IT will leverage its current expertise to deliver the full range of Siebel applications to both midmarket and enterprise-level clients. The firm's vision is to help clients become more profitable by improving their ability to manage customers. Apex IT has offices in Minneapolis, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, and Atlanta. The company has been providing CRM consulting services since 1997 and has done work for over 150 organizations.   A good contact at the company is Scott Newton at 678-513-1660 scott.newton@apexit.com.     

Siebel Systems Selects Actuate for Siebel 7

Actuate Corporation (Nasdaq: ACTU) and Siebel Systems have extended their relationship so that customers can continue to use Actuate technology in Siebel 7.

"Siebel Systems is pleased to announce it has selected Actuate as the preferred Report Delivery solution for the Siebel 7," said Richard Gorman, Senior Vice President of Products for Siebel Systems. "The Actuate e.Reporting Suite and Siebel Analytics are excellent complements," he added.   

Siebel Report Server provides customers with advanced Information Delivery capabilities including DHTML web browser report delivery, report scheduling, solution scalability, and cross-platform support within the context of the Siebel eBusiness Applications. Siebel Report Server enables the delivery of personalized and interactive reports to employees, customers and partners.

"For the last 50 years, the world's largest corporations have been collecting data in various backend systems and applications," said John Bow, vice president of the Actuate e.Business Application Partners business unit. "The time has come for these companies to use that information to their advantage, and facilitating the delivery of data is what Actuate is all about.  By embedding Actuate technology in Siebel 7, millions of Siebel users worldwide will benefit from unparalleled, 100 percent Web-based Information Delivery functionality."

Actuate has over 1,600 direct customers and more than 200 OEM partners, including almost thirty percent of the Fortune 1000. Founded in 1993, Actuate has headquarters in South San Francisco, California and offices worldwide.  

"The Actuate-Siebel alliance has become one of Actuate's most important relationships," said Allen Bonde founder of the Allen Bonde Group  ."Actuate has become the standard for reporting within the enterprise application space just as Siebel has become the standard within its space. This is just the renewing of vows between two market leaders."

Brian Vickery of Watch Hill Partners has written a report entitled Basic Actuate Siebel Report Writing. The report is available on the Siebel Observer Web Site (www.siebelobserver.com) or by clicking here.               

Partnership Between Siebel and SPL WorldGroup Helps Energy Companies Gain a Single View of Customers

SPL WorldGroup, one of the leading providers of customer management solutions to energy, water, and waste management industries, has successfully validated its CorDaptix version 1.2.5 with Siebel eEnergy 2000, the vertical application suite designed for the energy and utility industries.

SPL's CorDaptix has its roots in basic utility operations like credit and collections, account maintenance, service tracking and profiling.  Siebel eEnergy has its roots in product and service delivery, channel analysis, cross-sell, up-sell and the like.

As energy markets around the world have become increasingly competitive, traditional monopoly utilities have increasingly sought to add these functions. "Siebel and SPL share a number of marquee customers," said CD Hobbs, president of SPL WorldGroup, "including Electricite de France, TXU, and nPower. As leaders in competitive energy services, these companies need a single view of the customer in order to drive customer loyalty and reduce churn.  Now that SPL is a Siebel Premier Software Partner, we are integrating our strengths and ensuring that our best-of-breed solutions work seamlessly together to provide that view."

Under the terms of the Partnership, users access Siebel screens populated initially with data residing on the Siebel database. An XML query further populates the screen with data residing in SPL's CorDaptix in real time.   User changes alter data wherever it resides.

The resulting single view of the customer benefits users in a number of ways. Customer service reps, for instance, can increase problem resolution efficiency and enhance the level of customer service.  Companies can then use problem resolution as an opportunity to cross-sell and up-sell.

SPL WorldGroup, which employs over 600 people world wide, has an enviable record of 100% of its implementations going live. The company has never lost an existing customer. SPL is also very strong in its chosen markets; among its more than 50 customers are four of the world's top ten utilities. A good contact at the company is Lori Hobbs at 973-401-7531 or lori_hobbs@splwg.com.               

Melanie Bell Joins Pivotal

Pivotal Corporation (Nasdaq: PVTL) has appointed Melanie Bell, the former regional vice president of sales at Siebel Systems, to the position of senior vice president of North America strategic accounts and central region.

Bell has more than 16 years of enterprise software sales and technology experience including five years at Siebel Systems. In a single year, Bell contributed more than $18 million of license revenue as an individual contributor and $70 million of license revenue as a manager. For this Bell was awarded Siebel's highest honor, the "MVP" award. Bell was also the recipient of Siebel's "Top Sales Representative" and "Top Manager" awards.

Prior to Siebel, Bell worked at Dun & Bradstreet Software, Viasoft, and Union Pacific.