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

To: seth thomas who wrote (1598)	2/27/1998 12:40:00 PM
From: Muthian George	Respond to of 3033

Hi Folks! Here's another bit of news! Vantive Passes Competition in Sales Force Automation Market; More Companies Choosing Vantive Than Any Other High-End SFA Product Wednesday, February 25, 1998 06:02 AM > SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 25, 1998--The Vantive Corporation (NASDAQ:VNTV), the worldwide leader in the front-office automation software market, today announced that the company signed more than 100 new Sales Force Automation (SFA) customers in 1997. Vantive has added more new sales automation customers to date than any other high-end vendor. Global companies are selecting Vantive Sales over competitive products to increase sales performance, drive revenue growth and develop lifelong relationships with customers. New and existing Vantive Sales customers represent some of the world's largest companies in utilities, insurance, technology, health care, financial services and telecommunications. The newest Vantive Sales customers include: TAB Products, Marimba, Wright Express, US Surgical, UtiliCorp, NCR, Aetna International, Radiant Systems, Image Choice, Castelle, Global Access Telecom, United HealthCare, Dupont, Pharmacia Biotech, @Home Network, Campbell Software, Diamond Home Services, Softbank Services Group and Wang Laboratories. "We are proud that so many companies have chosen Vantive Sales," said Christopher Lochhead, executive vice president at Vantive. "Our main focus is working with our customers to ensure they are successful, productive and get real ROI. The results have paid off in spades as we continue to build momentum in the sales automation market and build long term customer successes." "Until recently, Vantive was viewed as a newcomer in the mobile sales automation market," said William Hills, senior analyst at Aberdeen Group. "Within a short time, however, they've made significant progress, and this testifies to the strength of their product in large mobile sales automation implementations." "The expansion of provider options in the sales process automation segment of the customer relationship management market is a positive development for both IT and users," said Barbara Noti, analyst with META Group's Application Delivery Strategies service. "Customers now have some real choices. Organizations looking at sales automation applications will benefit from exploring the spectrum of vendor options and evaluating deliverable feature/function, architecture, business processes and ability to implement rapidly and effectively." TAB Products, an expert in providing business solutions for the management of paper records, chose Vantive Sales over competitive solutions based on the product's proven performance, scalability, flexibility and ease of use. Tab is deploying Vantive Sales to its more than 750 sales and support professionals, including 450 mobile users, for its enterprise-wide sales automation project. "We are very excited to implement Vantive Sales as an integral part of our new sales methodology," said Pat Robitaille, CIO at TAB Products. "In addition to increasing the productivity of our sales force, Vantive Sales will enable sharing of critical customer information throughout the company." About Vantive Sales Vantive Sales is the only customer-aligned sales software that empowers companies to put their selling cycles in line with their customers' buying processes, provides critical knowledge on-demand, and increases sales representative's time with customers. Vantive Sales is a comprehensive sales solution that delivers proven mobile solutions with Vantive On-The-Go for breakthrough laptop data synchronization, and Vantive MiniVan, which allows access to the system from a cellular phone. The product delivers up-to-the-minute sales, product and customer information with the Vantive Encyclopedia, and provides a single source for managing tasks, contacts, opportunities and scheduling through Microsoft Outlook. Vantive Sales provides the most advanced pipeline and forecasting functionality, automates sales and marketing functions and is completely web-enabled. It can be implemented independently or as a part of the Vantive Enterprise, an integrated, enterprise-wide, sales, marketing and customer service system. About the Vantive Corporation Vantive is the worldwide leader in the front-office automation software market with more than 550 customers and $117M revenue in 1997. Vantive's vision, called customer asset management, enables companies to improve sales performance and enhance customer loyalty, by treating customers as the company's most valuable assets. The Vantive Enterprise is an integrated suite of web-enabled software that automates sales, marketing, call center and field service operations, and provides the foundation of customer asset management. Vantive Enterprise is differentiated by its rich functionality; proven mobile solutions; component-based, high-performance architecture; and time- and cost-effective implementations. Founded in 1990, Vantive is headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and distributes its products in more than two dozen countries. Contact the Vantive Corporation at 800/VANTIVE, 408/982-5700, or www.vantive.com. Vantive, Vantive Enterprise, Vantive Sales, Vantive Support, Vantive Quality, Vantive FieldService, Vantive HelpDesk, and VanWeb are trademarks of The Vantive Corporation. CONTACT: The Vantive Corporation Lisa Schulke, 408/982-5700 lisa_schulke@vantive.com or The Horn Group Jaia Zimmerman, 415/579-6463 jzimmerman@horngroup.com Quote for referenced ticker symbols: VNTVc 1998, Business Wire

To: seth thomas who wrote (1598)	2/27/1998 1:16:00 PM
From: Kevin Rose	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3033

Hi Steve: Thanks for the history. Honest and accurate, albeit from a different perspective than mine. I"d like to add a couple of mildly interesting notes. I apologize to all who are more interested in current events; please skip to the next message. One was that we also talked to Davidow. I can remember it clearly; his team sat three abreast, him in the middle, the bald bean counter/lawyer on his left, the young turk techno-weenie with the loud tie on his right. He liked our story, but wanted to cut the funding and get the product out quicker (9 mos instead of 18 mos). He also suggested we merge with the VNTV guy (we called him 'the Other'; I think it was just Sippl? at the time). We were uncomfortable with the change to the business plan, and probably wanted to remain independent (doesn"t everyone)? Anyway, we were that close to be one entity... Another interesting note: we SERIOUSLY considered SFA at the start. We brought in one fellow who had even started his own SFA business in the late '80s and failed. We wrote functional specs, and marketing overviews, on such an SFA product. We talked to potential customers. Our conclusion: sales organizations were not ready for such a product, and sales people were not ready for the structure imposed by such a product. My cut on the Information Workbench/Proactive history is a little different, which may just reflect competitive bias. My cut was that they stumbled early because they followed Davidow's model of 'spend less, don't do a lot, get it out earlier', which failed early on against us and Scopus. In fact, they were out well ahead of us, even though we actually started earlier. But when we finally came out, we got some good wins and customers. However, they recovered nicely in the following years, and bringing in new management bought them new life. The point Steve makes about us stumbling on customization is exactly true. We deluded ourselves into thinking we could provide 100% of the functionality that customers needed, and really skimped on customization tools. I'm ashamed to admit that our first screen customization tool was written in Hypercard, and ONLY RAN ON THE MAC! We got absolutely hammered, and had to go back and write a complete set of customization tools. Lesson for those out there (as stated previously on this thread): you may have 80-90% of what customer A needs, but that remaining 10-20% of what you DON"T have is different for each and every customer. Mildly interesting history; somewhat trivial in light of today's tremendous activity and SEBL's continued red hot run. Just one shot at SEBL: <war chant starts> VNTV, SCOP, and CLFY were forged in an atmosphere of incredible competitiveness which resulted in great achievements. Each of these companies still retains much of this spirit and competitiveness. If Tom thinks that marching into support is going to be like competing with AURM and BROC, God bless him. <end of war chant>. However, a warning to SEBL investors (I'm speaking to the normal individual investor): be extremely careful. When the 'pop goes the Seibel' happens, YOU are the ones that will wake up in the morning with the 50%+ losses, after the momentum guys are long gone. Set your target, and pull the trigger. Don't be greedy, and don't angst about selling too soon. Above all, do your own research (i.e. look at some numbers, people!) and make your own decisions. Good luck.