IBM sells customer care outsourcing unit for $505 million

Citing low profit margins, IBM has sold its customer care outsourcing business to Synnex for $505 million, the companies said Tuesday.

Synnex will combine the IBM business with its wholly owned subsidiary Concentrix, which operates in a similar field. Synnex will pay approximately $430 million in cash and $75 million in stock for the IBM business.

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"One of the most exciting things about this acquisition is being able to broaden our knowledge and vertical industry depth by the talent that is coming across from IBM," Concentrix President Chris Caldwell said in a teleconference.

IBM spun off the business unit as part of a long-running effort to shift its focus to areas in which it would make larger profit margins. It follows its divestiture of other relatively low-margin businesses, such as PCs, hard drives and point of sale (PoS) systems.

"This agreement is good for IBM as it furthers our focus on growing our software and cloud-based CRM [customer relationship management] solutions as part of [our] continuing shift to high value and innovative spaces," said Lori Steele, general manager of IBM Global Process Services.

Despite the sale, IBM says it will remain in the field of business process outsourcing (BPO), in which it runs entire business functions for some customers.

To that end, in 2012 IBM purchased Kenexa for $1.3 billion to strengthen its human resources business process services. And a year earlier it bought Emptoris to boost its portfolio in supply chain management services.

IBM will still have a foot in the customer care market as well, by selling software, consulting and other services that employ analysis software to personalize customer care.

Concentrix will become an IBM business partner and the companies will pursue business opportunities together, they said.

Concentrix runs customer care call centers on behalf of businesses such as banks, insurance firms and health care companies. It also provides front and back office services for retail stores and banks, and processes claims for insurance companies.

The IBM deal should bring it greater economies of scale, Caldwell said. With the acquisition, Synnex expects Concentrix to become one of the 10 top providers of CRM BPO services, a market that generates more than $55 billion in work annually, according to Synnex.

Joab Jackson covers enterprise software and general technology breaking news for The IDG News Service. Follow Joab on Twitter at @Joab_Jackson. Joab's email address is Joab_Jackson@idg.com.

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Upcoming Salesforce.com CRM release focuses on Chatter, customer service

Salesforce.com's next CRM (customer relationship management) software release will contain a slew of new features, with many focused on the Chatter collaboration and messaging tool as well as customer service, according to a set of official release notes.

Many new features associated with Chatter concern usability and access to the system. For example, now iOS device users will be able to launch Chatter Mobile from their Salesforce.com email.

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This is an important update "as most folks are still email-dependent," said analyst Ray Wang , CEO of Constellation Research.

Another major new feature, albeit available only as a pilot, is called Salesforce Files. It allows users to "securely sync files between Chatter and your desktop and some mobile devices," according to the notes. "This is the competitor to Box," and something customers should look at, Wang said.

For core sales automation, the upcoming release introduces Console for Sales.

This gives users "easy access to sales intelligence and helps you quickly contact leads, assess companies, and identify key contacts -- all in a dashboard-like interface that means more access to contextual data with fewer clicks and less scrolling," according to the notes.

Salesforce.com has also deepened the integration between its application and Microsoft Outlook.

Known as Winter '14, the new release also features improvements to Salesforce.com Communities, including the ability to assign a moderator to groups; and a series of usability updates within the Service Cloud product family, which includes Chatter Answers, Salesforce.com's knowledge base platform and Live Agent, among others.

Meanwhile, Winter '14's new feature lineup for analytics and mobile is less impressive, in Wang's view.

"Next to the mobile apps, analytics still is the weakest part of Salesforce.com," Wang said. "To be clear, it's better reporting and dashboards, not really analytics, as there are no predictive models, or algorithms applied here. This area will require the most attention in the long run but for now, reporting and KPIs are fairly decent."

Many of the new features in Winter '14 came from users' suggestions submitted through Salesforce.com's IdeaExchange, which is admirable on the company's part, Wang said.

As of November, Salesforce.com will no longer offer new customers the ability to purchase Unlimited Edition subscriptions, although it will support existing ones, according to the notes. Instead, the top-tier offering will be the recently announced Performance Edition, which costs more money but includes additional features.

It wasn't immediately clear Monday when the Winter '14 update will go live, although customers with Salesforce.com sandbox accounts can take part in a preview period that begins Sept. 6.

Chris Kanaracus covers enterprise software and general technology breaking news for The IDG News Service. Chris' email address is Chris_Kanaracus@idg.com

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10 security tips for customer support and service

CSO - What every company hopes dearly to avoid is the customer facing security incidents especially those involving compromise of customer information. While the issues related to retail customer information usually get primetime coverage, there is also the significant issue of B2B interactions with our corporate customers and partners.

Companies involved with software and system delivery projects often require customer service, sales and support staff to be deeply engaged with the customers. Often a single employee maybe dealing with multiple customers.

It is quite possible in this situation for an employee to accidentally send email with information for customer A to customer B. We're human, mistakes will happen. In my experience the more we can move to secure systems and processes, the less we need to depend on the busy employee to not make an honest mistake.

Below are top 10 tips for security organizations to implement for their support and services delivery organizations:

Move customer information out of email or local storage

Customer information should be maintained in a separate access controlled system with regular security reviews of access and usage. Customer passwords, account information etc should not be sitting in personal email accounts which can be compromised or accidentally mis-directed.

Strongly discourage storage of company data on personal accounts on public cloud systems. This cloud storage also exposes the company to high risk when such systems are hacked or compromised as in the case of Evernote earlier this year

Clearly separate out internal versus external customer content very explicitly

If you have to keep customer data in email or other local systems, and then make sure you put in as much system controls as possible to prevent accidental disclosure. If you are working on a customer issue that has an internal company thread, create separate folders for all customer communication and another separate folder for the internal thread. These separate folders ensures that you do not accidentally forward an internal thread to the customer. Mark all internal threads as 'INTERNAL'

Keep an eye on the training material and process

Employees will often create ad hoc material for one off training and sometimes will include customer data in this training material. Be very clear that no customer information is to be moved into training material at any time. Do not copy customer data into non-protected locations, spreadsheets or documents for training or other purposes. This information can be accidentally distributed to unauthorized recipients

Watch the new hires

New hires especially project managers or customer representatives may not fully get the implications of a data disclosure. They may not have enough time to understand the details of the systems before their first customer interaction, Make sure they get adequate new hire training on information security processes and data disclosure implications.

Follow a double check process

Ask employees to follow a 'double-check' process with customer communication. Every employee should check and check again all outgoing communication to the customer prior to sending. Verify that there is no confidential information going through.

Follow a simple data classification process

Mark email or documents as confidential when needed. This adds an additional layer of review.

Guard the customer data closely, even from the customer

Do not communicate customer login and password information via email to anyone including the customer. Customer staff or contractors may not be authorized to have the information/access level. Provide information based on the account setting only.

Be careful about what you sign and agree to with the customer

Do not sign any NDAs or security agreements without the approval of the Legal team

Change Customer system with caution

Some of our teams have actual access to customer systems to troubleshoot. Do not change settings or data on a customer system without communication in writing and (preferably) a backup

Encrypt hard drives

All Support and services staff should have encrypted hard drives whether they be USB sticks or laptop hard drives. Encryption reduces the risk of disclosure when the drive is lost.

George Viegas, CISSP, CISA is Director of Information Security at a leading multinational information and media company based in Los Angeles.

This story is reprinted from CSO Online.com, an online resource for information executives. Story Copyright CXO Media Inc., 2006. All rights reserved.

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Apple, Samsung nearly neck-and-neck in smartphone customer retention

Apple and Samsung were almost equally able to keep customers in their respective smartphone folds over the last 12 months, an analyst said Monday.

"Apple has built one of the world's most successful brands, and it's well known for the loyalty of its customers," said Michael Levin, co-founder of Chicago-based Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP). But Samsung's not that much different.

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"You can hate each other as much as you want, but you're the same," said Levin of the two groups.

According to CIRP, 42 percent of iPhone buyers over the last year had upgraded from an older iPhone, a sign of customer loyalty.

But Samsung's ties were nearly as strong: 38 percent of Samsung smartphone buyers had come from an older Samsung smartphone.

The nearly identical statistics for Apple and Samsung were unexpected. "It really surprised us, that Samsung's brand loyalty was nearly equal Apple's," Levin said.

For those figures and others Levin cited, CIRP had tallied four quarterly surveys conducted between July 2012 and June 2013; each survey polled 500 Americans who had bought a smartphone in the preceding 90 days.

Levin attributed Samsung customer loyalty to its aggressive brand marketing, including in-store placements and a strong string of television ads. "Samsung threw a lot of money at [brand awareness], and to a large extent, they succeeded," he said.

There were differences between the two companies' ability to woo each other's customers, however. Among people who switched brands, Apple was able to pilfer three times as many Samsung customers (33 percent) as Samsung was able to steal from Apple (11 percent), Levin said.

Meanwhile, Samsung had the advantage over Apple in drawing customers from so-called feature phones, the basic models whose sales were eclipsed by smartphones for the first time in the quarter that ended June 30. CIRP's data said that 37 percent of Samsung smartphone owners had upgraded from a feature phone, while only 26 percent of Apple customers had dumped a basic model for an iPhone.

Levin credited Samsung's broader smartphone portfolio -- it has many more models than does Apple, with a wider range of prices -- for the company's ability to attract feature phone owners.

Other data collected by CIRP included PC and Mac ownership -- as expected, iPhone owners were more likely to own an Apple Mac, while Samsung customers were more likely to own a Windows PC -- age, income, and education.

Generally speaking, Apple smartphone owners were slightly younger than Samsung's customers, and more likely to have an annual income over $75,000 and a college or advanced degree.

Apple and Samsung are nearly neck-and-neck in their ability to hang onto customers.

Gregg Keizer covers Microsoft, security issues, Apple, Web browsers and general technology breaking news for Computerworld. Follow Gregg on Twitter at @gkeizer, on Google+ or subscribe to Gregg's RSS feed. His email address is gkeizer@computerworld.com.

See more by Gregg Keizer on Computerworld.com.

Read more about smartphones in Computerworld's Smartphones Topic Center.

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Business Rx: In need of advice for good customer service

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The Entrepreneur

When Mondiu Ladejobi’s uncle died in Nigeria, he wanted to send money for the funeral. But the process of using a wire transfer service to send the money was inconvenient and plagued with poor service. Ladejobi was frustrated, and he knew many others in his situation were, too. He began exploring how to tackle the problem.

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Ladejobi teamed up with Shade Adeyosoye. They are in the prototype phase of Payvius, a solution that will allow consumers to use mobile technology to transfer money.

The pitch

Ladejobi

“Payvius is an international mobile money transfer service that helps beneficiaries’ lower the costs of accessing micro-finance in developing economies by leveraging mobile and cloud technology to reduce money-transfer overhead costs. Payvius was launched out of frustration with available money transfer solutions — which are expensive, inconvenient for both senders and recipients and often hampered by poor customer service.

“Whenever I send money to family and friends overseas, I always leave the experience disappointed, shaking my head and thinking there just has to be a better way. We are focused on helping millions of hard-working migrants and immigrants here in the United States save on the costs of sending international money transfers, making more money available for their loved ones overseas. Payvius then leverages these money transfers to empower recipients to become economically self-sufficient.

“Payvius is currently seeking funding to develop a proof-of-concept focusing on a country in sub-Saharan Africa.

“Granted, there are numerous challenges to overcome as a legal money transfer operator — regulatory licensing and auditing, security measures to combat fraud and anti-money laundering, significant capital investment requirements. These are all natural barriers of entry that can be quantified and controlled to some extent. What is more challenging will be what we cannot directly control — the end experience for recipients overseas.

“These money transfers are primarily going to cash-based economies where technical infrastructure is still evolving. We will have to rely on partnerships with leading mobile money players at the destination to close the transfer loop. Establishing these relationships is going to be a key part of our business model as we expand operations to different countries. How do we impress upon our overseas partners the importance of maintaining superior customer service? Are there any accountability measures we can employ?

The advice

Elana Fine, managing director, the Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship

“Define a very specific training process for bringing on new partners. Think of it like your own ‘Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval,’ and come up with specific incentives and measures to ensure your partners live up to your expectations. Potential incentives for partners could include a revenue-share model for repeat customers.

“To keep partners accountable, consider implementing a simple text survey for users. Or you could incorporate something along the lines of eBay’s power-seller model, where partners with the highest levels of customer service are the most recommended. You also need to come up with a quick remedy to reprimand or cut ties with partners that don’t live up to your standards.

“The larger issue for you is determining where customer service fits into your value proposition. I don’t know that you need to solve for superior customer service with your international partners — you just need to make sure people get their money. Your value proposition is on the U.S. end, where customer service is an issue for people sending the money. For people sending funds, ease of the transaction and customer service is critical and something you can control. You do absolutely need to find trustworthy partners on the other end — you don’t want to worry they are embezzling money — but keep in mind that there might be a lower bar on the other end of the transaction and you might not need to focus on customer service beyond guaranteeing receipt of funds.”

The reaction

Ladejobi

“You are absolutely correct when you suggest the larger issue is determining where customer service fits in our value proposition — for Payvius we consider this a major part of our differentiation. Accountability is essential, and we agree that we need to come up with a fair and quick process for severing ties with partners who do not meet our standards. We will certainly incorporate your feedback and suggestions in future discussions with partners both in the U.S. and overseas.”

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