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Technology Stocks : Siebel Systems (SEBL) - strong buy? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: seth thomas who wrote (1523)	5/15/1998 9:43:00 AM
From: Lizzie Tudor	Respond to of 6974

I'm not disagreeing with Steven Farber or Melissa on this, but for those of you that don't know, Cisco is a tough account. If you have a product you want to codevelop with a customer, and you mention to the team that the customer is Cisco, lots of engrs will quit. Apparently they do things like assign 5 day devt schedules to things that actually take 2 mos, etc. So if Sebl lost their acct with Cisco, it could easily be unrealistic expectations on the part of Cisco mgmt vs. a fundamental flaw in Sebl. And if Vntv went in there, they could very well have the same problems. Losing 2 accts, I agree it looks bad if thats what happened. Sebl should use Sun as their reference acct. Sun is reasonable, and they are setting up a direct model just like Dell. They sure have a lot of salespeople over there. Michelle

To: seth thomas who wrote (1523)	5/15/1998 1:55:00 PM
From: Melissa McAuliffe	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 6974

Steve, So in effect the only salient FACTS are that Cisco and Lucent are no longer on sebl's website and that sebl customers are contractually prohibited from sharing information about the software with "outsiders". Cisco and Lucent could have been dropped from the web site for a multiplicity of reasons. Right now you don't know the reason. If anyone has more information as to the reason maybe they can share it with us. With respect to contractually restricting customers from speaking about the system and/or their experiences.....This whole concept of contractually restricting this is not a new concept in the software industry though I don't believe it was ever really enforced. As I said previously I am certain they are allowed to speak to propsective customers when approved by sebl. My opinion is that this is a wise move on sebl's part and more companies should enforce this concept contractually. There have been so many instances of companies sharing proprietary information with outsiders (i.e. competitors) that maybe it's not such a bad idea. I don't believe this is new information either so if it weren't for the FACT that Cisco and Lucent are no longer on the web site we wouldn't be discussing it at all at this point. BTW, I would be very surprised to hear that VNTV has a 100% referenceable customer base. Every vendor has a skeleton or two in their closets. I think this whole thing w/vntv is very simply a marketing ploy to try to play to what they perceive as sebl's' weakness. There's nothing wrong with that and it's a good strategy. Will it work. That remains to be seen. There was a small company called Data Design Associates back in the mainframe days. This was their strategy. This was not a deal breaker. Nor do I think they won a lot of deals with this strategy since they stayed small. Will it come up as an issue? Usually. But it can be dealt with quite well.. What exactly are these hedge fund managers that you met w/concerned about anyway? That Cisco and Lucent aren't on the website? I'm sure they thought this up themselves, right??

To: seth thomas who wrote (1523)	5/15/1998 6:29:00 PM
From: Lee L.	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 6974

It is FACT that SEBL customers are prevented from talking by contractual arrangement. This is not a FACT. As a customer, I can say whatever I want about my company's Siebel implementation. I cannot disclose detailed information about the product -- functionality or architecture; but nothing prevents me from telling the world about my opinion about the company or our implementation. I'm sure that this would be the case with Cisco or others.