***slightly OT***
cute, albeit four-week old, comments from Forrester on E.piphany follow. at $19M in ttm sales -- ooo, lookie, double with Octane! -- and a stock-price that's been nearly quartered, i'll refrain from the obvious "epiphany" jokes. to borrow a phrase, however, i will recommend that you not operate heavy machinery immediately after digesting it.
-----
The Forrester Brief
E.piphany's High-Octane Strategy Will Pay Off
March 15, 2000
by: Bob Chatham with Laurie M. Orlov
E.piphany's $3.2 billion acquisition of Octane will propel it to Internet-based CRM market leadership. Its move trumps the recent Kana/Silknet deal and forces a response from Siebel.
E.piphany CEO Roger Siboni and Octane CEO Tim Guleri yesterday evening announced that E.piphany will acquire Octane for 26.8% of E.piphany's stock -- worth $3.2 billion at the market's close. We spoke with both CEOs before the announcement and conclude that this deal is a bold, brilliant move because:
* The technologies are a near-perfect complement. No redundancy in the product suites will make for clean technical and business integration with no apologies to existing customers. The combined suite addresses information about all channels and audiences except field sales and service forces -- which can be integrated with products from apps vendors like Pivotal or Clarify.
* eRM is now within reach. Firms will get a head start on a unified customer view by matching Octane's modern architecture for managing customer communications with E.piphany's experience in collecting, synchronizing, and analyzing data from customer touchpoints. Once E.piphany nails down the integration with the field sales force, they will provide a solid foundation for an eRM strategy.
* Kana/Silknet must scramble. Compared to E.piphany/Octane, Kana/Silknet looks like a scruffy portfolio of technologies. To counter E.piphany's challenge, Kana/Silknet must: 1) revamp its data integration architecture and bring it to the forefront; 2) beef up its marketing execution, analytics, and recommendations capabilities; and 3) quickly demonstrate to customers that it can combine six companies into a seamless entity -- in record time.
* Siebel's on notice. Legacy market leader Siebel can no longer just watch the developments in the Internet-based CRM market. It must: 1) demonstrate Internet fluency and a commitment to customer self-service by acquiring a vendor like Servicesoft; 2) strengthen its marketing analytics to pull within striking distance of E.piphany's E.4 System by acquiring a vendor like Knowledge Stream Partners or Customer Analytics; and 3) acquire a recommendation engine like Verbind or Net Perceptions to match E.4's capabilities in real-time marketing. |
