Siebel: Exciting times in Asia
Published: 07 May 2002 15:51 BST
Terence Chan's obsession with customer service is bringing in the business for Siebel Systems.
Despite last year's battered economy, the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software giant registered over 100 percent revenue growth in South Asia. And it is anticipating a better 2002.
"I am optimistic," said Terence Chan, Siebel's managing director for South Asia, in a recent interview. "Many companies are seriously considering a buy."
Siebel sells software that aims to help companies streamline their customer service activities, including finding new buyers and managing current ones, as well as supporting their sales personnel in decision making. The main motivation behind a CRM implementation is to drive sales.
Although Chan would not reveal revenue projections, he firmly believes businesses are more ready to spend this year compared with the previous one.
His bright outlook is accompanied by plans to establish one to two additional offices in Indonesia, Thailand or the Philippines this year. Siebel is also poised to scale up its regional workforce of close to 100 employees in Singapore, Malaysia and India. No further details were provided.
"The need to build better customer relationships to improve loyalty and sales cannot be denied -- even with a contrained IT budget," noted Chan.
"Moreover, the Asian CRM market is only at the beginning of the growth curve," he said. Specifically, huge opportunities are expected to come from the financial services and telecommunications industries -- areas which Siebel has been dominating globally. The firm will also actively pursue deals in emerging markets, such as government, pharmaceutical, high-tech, travel and transport.
Unfazed by rivals' software giveaway tactics, Chan said Siebel will be "flexible" in pricing. "Customers are still coming to me although SAP, Oracle and PeopleSoft have literally been throwing their software for free," he claimed.
Last year, Siebel scored major wins with the Development Bank of Singapore, Virgin Mobile in Singapore, Malaysian National Insurance and telecommunications service provider Advanced Info Systems in Thailand. The value of these contracts were not disclosed.
Globally, Siebel racked up sales of $2.05bn for the year ending December 2001, up 14 percent annually. The San Mateo, California-based firm does not provide revenue breakdown by region.
Walking the talk
If customer service is all it takes to create a successful company, Chan probably has the formula, having been in the CRM business for close to two years.
"One of the lessons learnt from the past year is the importance of understanding customers' objectives, so as to make every CRM project a success," noted the ex-SAP Asia executive.
"I normally have some hard words with the C-level management of the company which buys my product," said the 42-year-old Chan, who is fearful of virtually nothing except a bad reputation. "I tell my customers, 'It's not going to work if you just load a software'."
A successful CRM implementation has to be part of a business strategy, which includes changing business practices to focus on customer needs and reorganizing databases to ensure quick data retrieval.
Of course, it does not do Siebel any good if a CRM implementation fails. That explains why Chan would normally insist on top management's involvement and commitment to such a project. There were also instances when he helped customers develop business goals. "My reputation is more important than just making a sale," said Chan.
In a recent research report, ABN AMRO projected that the global CRM market will reach $3.36bn next year, up 25.8 percent from 2002. Siebel is expected to lead the sector with a 45 percent market share in 2002. In a distant second will be SAP (16 percent), followed by PeopleSoft (8 percent). In 2003, ABN AMRO expects Siebel to widen its lead at the expense of SAP and PeopleSoft.
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