Meta Facts

Summary of META Group’s Weekly Research Meeting

PeopleSoft ‘annunciates’ its campaign management strategy

PeopleSoft continues to expand its CRM suite by acquiring distressed best-of-breed vendors. After purchasing Calico’s product configuration and interactive selling technology in December, it is now acquiring Annuncio’s collaborative, personalised website and e-mail marketing capabilities; this complements PeopleSoft’s customer analytics and operational marketing support (e.g. budgeting). We have only modest concern about the technical and cultural integration of these organisations (initial data integration should be straightforward, given Annuncio’s previous experience), but advise PeopleSoft’s large-scale B2C clients (e.g. in telecommunications and financial services) to obtain high-end campaign management functionality and advanced analytics via PeopleSoft’s Unica partnership.

Bottom Line: Further consolidation in the CRM space will give the suite vendors more best of breed capability during the next 18-24 months. Therefore, organisations should increasingly limit users’ choices in this space.

Shifting management costs into application budgets

In our recent spending survey, systems management disciplines were down in 2002 as a relative priority (including network, application, and infrastructure management, plus various hosting services). Ill-defined and ill-measured IT disciplines and tools will be negatively impacted by the economy (-5 to -10 percent through 2003), from both prioritisation and budget perspectives, as customers put budget funds where ROI is more visible and more easily explained (e.g. security, applications). However, actual management and tool spending will rise slightly due to expanded performance requirements for key application/business areas (e.g. ERP, CRM).

Bottom Line: IT groups must continue to review service-level postures that prove their performance. However, proof points will not likely change investment considerations until 2004.

In Gates we trust?

Last week, Microsoft ‘leaked’ a Bill Gates memo titled ‘Trustworthy Computing’. Comparing the memo to those galvanising MSFT’s focus on the Internet and .Net, Gates stressed availability, security, and privacy. The memo emphasises two elements of trustworthy systems: 1) process - ‘training all our developers in the latest secure coding techniques’ (critical for consistent enterprisewide development); and 2) architecture redesign around .Net. Although .Net (as well as XML Web services) provides a trustworthy computing framework, MSFT must work with vendors to quickly introduce Web services standards concerning three federated issues: availability (eliminating unplanned downtime), change management (reducing planned downtime), and end-to-end quality of service.

Bottom Line: For Web services to become a trustworthy computing paradigm, Microsoft and other vendors must quickly flesh out the architecture.

Wringing results from receivables

Companies that are electronically enabling a greater portion of their supply chain partners and customers via the Internet should also consider investing strategically (by 2H02) in systems that enable invoicing and payment process efficiencies. Electronic data interchange (EDI) has limited value versus the implications of compressing receivables. Because payments are often contingent on other factors (e.g. risk, contractual terms and conditions, management of reconciliation processes and disputes), accounts-receivable and days-sales- outstanding performance indicators can be improved when payment processing management includes analytics and rapid resolution management. Vendors that are defining this market include eFunds, Aceva, TradeCard, and Fidesic.

Bottom Line: Companies should prepare for improved control over resolution processes and supplier analytics that can accelerate accounts receivable.

For more information contact Sriram.Ramamoorthy @metagroup.com