Firms giving CRM another go

Worldwide customer relationship management (CRM) software revenue topped £3.1bn in 2005, up nearly 14% from 2004, as companies look at ways to fuel new revenue growth rather than cut costs suggests analyst firm Gartner.

“As business confidence returned in a strong commercial economy, buyers focused on products that drive revenue and expand business opportunities," says Sharon Mertz, research director.

This is a vast improvement over CRM’s performance over the previous few years, when the industry experienced negative or less than 1% growth between 2002 and 2004.

SAP retains its number one spot with a 26% piece of the CRM pie, followed by Siebel with 17%. But despite the PeopleSoft acquisition, Oracle’s market share fell 11.7%.

This dramatic fall is partly because Gartner has changed the way it works out its market share and now looks at revenue from updates, subscriptions, maintenance and technical support as well as licence revenue.