Comverse Infor a Customer Management Ride

Comverse announced today it would embed customer relationship management features from Alpharetta, Ga.-based Infor into its Comverse ONE Billing and Active Customer Management solution. Infor is a $2 billion revenue company with more than 70,000 customers and 8,000 employees of its own.

Infor acquires and improves enterprise software more often than builds it, and will add some of its sales, marketing and services functionality to the Comverse platform to further improve subscriber acquisition, retention and campaign management capabilities.

Comverse ONE allows operators to consistently manage any subscriber, any service on any network, with any payment type and supports all customer touch including the call center, Web, handset or other mobile device. With Infor’s CRM software, Comverse ONE will include new functionality, such as: sales force automation, campaign management, and interaction and case management.

“The main consideration for choosing Infor was their product capability. We weren’t looking for general purpose software, we wanted specific capabilities, especially sales force automation and campaign management,” said Gabriel Matzliach, general manager of billing and active customer management for Comverse.

Matzliach added that Infor does have a strong presence in telecom, but that telecom is not its primary market. “They are a leading business solution provider doing a lot around retail and other industries. This gives us some exclusivity in telecom, which is beneficial,” he said.

Andre Dahan, president and CEO of Comverse, said that with these new capabilities, Comverse ONE now spans and accelerates the entire prospect-to-cash process. “With marketing becoming the key battleground for operators, Comverse will now be offering our customers the most comprehensive and targeted tools to compete in their marketplace,” he said.

Greg Corgan, president of global field operations at Infor, said, “We share Comverse’s insight that solutions providing a 360-degree view of the customer allow operators to maintain a great customer experience with current and prospective customers, bringing all channels and sources together to create one experience.”