Siebel Systems has acquired Dublin-based banking
software developer Eontec to add transactional capabilities to its
banking CRM and analytics offerings.
The company paid $70m cash for the company, and will pay up to
$60m more in cash throughout 2005 if revenue and
customer-satisfaction targets are met.
Eontec developed a Java-based suite of applications for handling
branch, call centre and internet transactions. Its nine customers -
three of which are also Siebel customers - include Commonwealth
Bank of Australia, which supports three million customers on
Eontec's Internet banking system, and Canada's CIBC, which runs its
teller systems in 1,200 branches on Eontec's software.
Siebel and Eontec began working together at the end of last year
at the behest of several joint customers, according to Richard
Campione, general manager of Siebel's financial services and public
sector group. Their integrated software, available now, gives
Siebel a fairly complete package of banking transaction, sales,
service and analytics products.
Siebel sees the banking industry as one in the midst of billions
in IT spending as companies replace ageing systems and build
infrastructure for new channels such as online banking. Executives
said in October that a new customer console system for branch banks
would be a major addition to Siebel's 7.7 software release, due
shortly.
That console is now linked with Eontec's software and part of
Siebel's expanded banking product lineup, Campione said.
Siebel's competitors in the banking market include Fidelity
National Financial, which provides banking technology systems and
services to institutions that outsource those functions, and S1
Corp., which sells a variety of multichannel financial services
applications.
Meanwhile, Siebel Systems and NCR's Teradata division are
deepening their existing alliance and optimising Siebel's analytics
software for use with Teradata's data warehouse.
Siebel's 150 analytics applications will generate
Teradata-specific SQL, allowing customers to mine data from
Teradata's warehouse more easily, and in greater detail. The
integration is now available to initial customers and will be
generally available in the third quarter.
The companies will also release an integration methodology for
connecting Teradata's industry-specific data models with Siebel's
analytics software. Teradata's models are available for industries
including financial services, retail, travel, manufacturing and
health care.
Stacy Cowley writes for IDG News
Service