IBM, Kana in customer data management alliance
NEW YORK, Aug 16 (Reuters) - International Business Machines Corp.(NYSE:IBM - news) and Kana Communications Inc. (NasdaqNM:KANA - news) said on Wednesday they had formed a global strategic alliance to provide systems that will allow businesses to manage interactions with customers and business partners over the Web.
The alliance could mean as much as $1 billion in revenues for the two companies within the next couple of years, said Stephanie Hahn, general manager for IBM's customer relationship management business.
The alliance calls for Kana's software, which manages data on customers and business partners, to be combined into IBM's line of computer hardware, software and services.
``We're going to integrate their software with our middleware on our hardware platform, developing services as well,'' said Hahn. ``Then we are going to carry out joint marketing and our sales team will jointly sell the products.''
Potential customers would include Internet start-ups as well as Fortune 2000 companies, including finance, telecommunications and retail companies, she said. |
