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Microsoft Dynamics 3.0 is one month old and is establishing a presence in the market. Oracle was the chief newsmaker in the CRM market in 2005. Microsoft has increased the customer base for its CRM application by 100% every year. At present the company has 5,500 clients for its CRM software.

Microsoft customers who are already using Microsoft CRM 1.2 have been offered version 3.0 before other customers. The Missouri House of Representatives, which implemented Microsoft 1.2 an year ago, has deployed a beta of version 3.0 since November and is satisfied with the results.

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 is well-integrated with the Outlook e-mail application. The software is easy to customize. It features a mobile client, marketing resource management, and campaign and list management. Microsoft partners can charge users on a per-use basis. The next release of the application, which is code-named Titan, will allow users to run multiple instances of the application from one server. This facility is currently provided by hosted CRM providers such as Salesforce.com, NetSuite Inc., RightNow Technologies and Salesnet Inc. Multi-tenancy allows for easy implementation, provides economies of scale and therefore reduces start-up costs.

Microsoft CRM 3.0 does not support a multi-tenant environment and the company has charged its partners with the responsibility of hosting the application. Inetium and Avanade are partners of Microsoft and are weighing the hosted option.

Rimini Street Inc. which provides support and alternative maintenance for Siebel software licensees had acquired CRM and ERP consulting firm Sidney Blue, LLC. Based in San Francisco, Sidney Blue is a consulting firm that offers implementation and upgrade services to Siebel licensees that include Toyota Financial Service, Philips Medical, Juniper Networks, etc. ccnmatthews.com says:

The new acquisition furthers Rimini Street’s mission to redefine enterprise software support by enabling accelerated support team growth and expanding Rimini Street’s pool of highly experienced and trained Siebel specialists.

Go to: Rimini Street Announces Acquisition of CRM and ERP Consulting Firm Sidney Blue, LLC

San Diego-based Sharp HealthCare has selected crmView CRM solution developed by Solucient. crmView facilitates the building of a CRM database by providing consumer research and online reporting functionalities along with HouseholdView, a proprietary healthcare segmentation system developed by Solucient. businesswire.com says:

Although Sharp evaluated other CRM tools for consideration, Solomon noted that Solucient’s crmView provided the "best overall value for the investment."

Go to: Solucient Expands Relationship with Sharp HealthCare

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 has been launched in India. Microsoft aims to make the solution available across all segments, from SMBs to enterprises. Medium and large enterprises can make use of the Professional edition while SMBs have a Small Business edition targeted at them. The solution, which offers a full suite of marketing and sales capabilities, is easy to customize and deploy for the achievement of measurable business results.

Sage Software has stated that the Sage CRM SalesLogix has been rated as the leading CRM software for mid-sized businesses and small businesses by Forrester Research in its Forrester Wave Midmarket Sales Force Automation Q4 2005 report. Sage CRM is available for on-site deployment and as a hosted service. ciol.com says:

Sage CRM SalesLogix identified as the only solution to attain leadership status across 151 criteria in both medium-size and small business category evaluations.

Go to: Sage attains leadership position in mid-market sales force automation

Last year, Oracle issued new tariff rates for servers that were using multi-core processors. The latest changes in its licensing structures may be beneficial to users of Sun. itweek.co.uk says:

Significantly, Oracle will charge a factor of just 0.25 of a single-core CPU fee per core for UltraSparc T1 processors that squeeze in eight cores per CPU. Therefore, Oracle software running on eight cores would require only two software licences.

Go to: Oracle fees favour Sun users

According to the latest figures by Frost and Sullivan, the Asia Pacific region continues to be the most popular destination for contact-center outsourcing. The report "Assessment of the Asia Pacific Contact Center Market" by Frost and Sullivan mentions that the number of contact centers in the Asia-Pacific region in 2004 was in excess of 21, 360. It is expected to grow to 39, 247 by the end of the year 2011.

The strengthening of outsourcing is being driven by India and the emergent trend of near-shoring in which companies in Japan and South Korea are transferring their contact center operations to China. Malaysia manages contact center operations of Singapore-based companies whereas India and the Philippines are getting work from Australia. 70% of the total contact center work in the Asia-Pacific region originates in the United States.

Even though the business case for offshoring business processes to the Asia-Pacific region is strong, the process is not quite simple, for example, Dell reduced the scale of its operations in India as agents with neutral accents were hard to come by. Several contact centers are hiring British, Australian, and US citizens to try and solve accent-related issues. Another problem for contact centers is the high attrition rate. According to Frost and Sullivan, the average attrition rate is around 19.8% and is higher in India and the Philippines.

The Asia-Pacific region remains the preferred location for offshoring as it offers quality services at low cost; however, on the lines of the Japan-China near-shoring trend, several European countries are outsourcing to places that offer a certain comfort level. Germany is outsourcing its contact center operations to Romania and Poland as the people there are conversant with the German language and the countries are nearer to visit in case of eventualities. Similarly, North Africa is attracting contact center work from France.

Latin American and Caribbean nations are expected to experience growth of the contact center industry, partly because of the requirements of the Spanish speaking market and also as the operating costs are lower than in the Asia-Pacific region. According to a study by Zagada Markets, 50, 000 jobs will be created in the Caribbean this year.

Sage Group, which is based in the United Kingdom, will be acquiring Verus Financial Management in a cash deal of US $ 325 million. Sage hopes to improve its services to mid-sized companies in the United States by means of this deal. Verus is based in Nashville, Tenn. and is a division of Financial Technology Ventures. Its forte is credit-card and check processing services to SMBs. crmbuyer.com says:

Verus has more than 100,000 merchant customers, ranging from online retailers to gas stations, restaurants and car dealerships. Verus’ revenues come from service fees linked to processed sales transactions.

Go to: Sage Eyes Mid-Sized Market as It Buys US Payment Processing Firm

Mark Anthony Group, which is based in Vancouver and manufactures and distributes wines and beverages, has selected the CRM solution by Microsoft because it integrates well with MS Office applications that the company employees are comfortable with. The company hopes that by upgrading to Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0, it will be able to integrate data that currently resides in various repositories. The manner in which MAG is deploying CRM points toward a trend in which the distinctions between traditional applications are getting blurred. cio-today.com says:

MAG, for example, is integrating CRM over its customer contact chain to track issues such as missing product and delayed orders.

Go to: CRM Moves Beyond Sales Automation

Daylite 3.0 Public Beta, the latest version of the business productivity application by Marketcircle, Inc., has been released by the company. Daylite 3.0 improves the management of business productivity processes by providing both single and multiple user settings. Timesaving features include delegation capabilities, shared calendars and meetings, mini heads-up display, etc. prnewswire.com says:

"Daylite 3.0 is a milestone achievement for the Mac community, and directly addresses the day-to-day needs of Mac-based small businesses," said Alykhan Jetha, President and CEO of Marketcircle.

Go to: Evolving From CRM: Marketcircle Debuts Daylite 3.0