IBM and E.piphany have announced an agreement to integrate
E.piphany's customer relationship management solutions with IBM's
e-business middleware, hardware and services.
E.piphany's entire suite of CRM applications will be optimised for
IBM's J2EE (Java 2 Enterprise Edition) WebSphere Application
Server, AIX operating system and DB2 database platforms. The aim is
to target financial services and telecoms markets.
Gartner research director Gareth Herschel hinted that the deal
could indicate IBM's lack of confidence in its existing CRM
partner, Siebel Systems, which is strong on call centre and field
sales channel applications rather than marketing and
analytics.
"Part of it is Siebel isn't J2EE," said Herschel. "Siebel has been
struggling particularly in business-to-consumer industries. If
Siebel gets knocked out of the deal then IBM risks getting knocked
out of the deal."
However, Rob Saultz, vice-president of CRM solutions at IBM,
insisted that the move was part of the company's strategy to
partner with the best-of-breed software companies.
"This is not in any way, shape or form a lack of confidence in
Siebel," Saultz said. "We're focusing on the [financial services
and communications] marketplaces and looking to gain some traction
there with a solution that includes E.piphany for our solution
maps."
Herschel added that for E.piphany, the deal means a much-needed
boost in credibility. The company has struggled for some time to
boost revenue.