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Technology Stocks : Vantive Corporation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Trader Dave who wrote (1541)	2/21/1998 10:33:00 AM
From: Shege Dambanza	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3033

Maybe reduced support costs aren't the only thing that's important. How about customer responsiveness, retention and satisfaction. I absolutely agree. However, few companies track such things as customer responsiveness, retention and satisfaction. Even if these things are measured, it is difficult to show a finance type (e.g. a CFO) that these things are 1) contributors to revenue/profit and 2) primarily caused by automation. A lot of automation is in fact based on faith that there will be benefits down the line. Most ROI analyses (e.g. the testimonial from the Compaq guy in Siebel ads) are based on flawed and wishful thinking. Manufacturing processes, OTOH, are far more measured and it is easier to determine cause-and-effect relationships and so justify ERP/SCM spending.