Siebel

Siebel is a prominent vendor of interoperable e-business software. They also call themselves Siebel Systems. The company's customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource management (ERM), and partner relationship management (PRM) applications are designed to automate those aspects of business and allow an enterprise to perform and coordinate associated tasks over the Internet and through other channels, such as retail or call center networks. Siebel's customers include Chase Manhattan Bank, Deutsche Telecom, IBM, Lucent, Yahoo, and Microsoft.

CEO Thomas M. Siebel founded the company in 1993 in San Mateo, California. Frequently cited as an industry expert, Siebel is the author of Cyber Rules, Taking Care of Business, and Virtual Selling. According to Siebel, the advent of Web services has led to an increasing switch to what he calls business process computing, in which interconnected applications support all of an enterprise's processes. In an article in InformationWeek, Siebel said that interoperable e-business software can drastically improve the efficiency of business processes. Citing an insurance industry example, Siebel said such applications would allow a customer request for a new policy to be processed in real time during a single interaction, rather than the several days that the transaction typically requires.

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