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Astea Announces Next Generation Web-based CRM Solution

Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6 debuts easy-to-configure Portal technology and enhanced CRM functionality including marketing and multi-channel contact center automation


HORSHAM, Pa.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 28, 2002-- Astea International Inc. (NASDAQ:ATEA - News), a leading provider of Service Smart, Enterprise Proven CRM solutions, today announced Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6, a comprehensive software suite designed to meet the unique needs of companies that market, sell, support and service mission-critical assets. Designed from the ground-up for the Internet, Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6 helps companies extend relationships from the field to the front office, increase revenue, reduce costs, and improve service consistency across the organization. The software suite consists of modular, fully integrated applications for marketing, sales, customer contact centers, and service. It enables real-time information sharing among local, remote and mobile employees. The new release provides the same robust functionality in use today at hundreds of Astea customer sites, but it has been completely re-architected to be browser-based and portal-driven.
"This is not generic CRM," said Zack Bergreen, president and chief executive officer, Astea. "Astea has taken the initiative to develop technology that addresses the unique challenges faced by companies for which resource downtime is not an option. Our new version integrates seamlessly with Astea's legacy capabilities to deliver immediate business advantages for companies that are committed to raising the bar for customer service."

Web-based Platform

With this release, Astea AllianceEnterprise has moved to a Web-based framework. The result is a rich user experience delivered through a smart client interface, providing the functionality, ease and flexibility-of-use companies demand. It offers the power of portals and browser-based solutions, within a reliable, scalable architecture.

Web-based applications provide one-touch access to all the information within the database in real-time, from virtually anywhere in the world.
The software is designed to give companies a choice of easily deploying on Microsoft SQL Server 2000 or Oracle 9i database applications.
New technology platform provides a series of individualized portals based on users' preferences, roles, and entitlements greatly simplifying system navigation and ensuring content relevance.
Incorporates powerful business process optimization - an innovative approach to defining and executing customer-focused business processes at the end-user and enterprise level.
Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6 is fully compatible with Astea's earlier AllianceEnterprise, ServiceAlliance and SalesAlliance products. Migration to the new suite from Astea's legacy system, Dispatch-1, is also fully supported through the Company's iDAC (integrated Dispatch-1 to AllianceEnterprise Conversion) program.

Support for Global Enterprises

Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6 has been designed at its core to support global enterprises with a comprehensive internationalized product.

Single Database -- Multilingual Data - Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6 suite supports European language (including English, French and German) and double-byte Asian language (including Kanji, Mandarin and Thai) character data to be stored together in a single database. Because multi-national organizations often need to collaborate across country lines, Astea has introduced the unique capability for users in different countries to see data from other countries in their preferred language.
Fully Integrated Global Environments - Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6 also provides seamless translation between time zones, currencies, taxation methods, and other unit-of- measure implications.
Major Upgrades to Existing Solutions

The new suite includes enhanced functionality such as Personalized User Portals, Customer Portal, Knowledge Management, Multi-Channel Contact Center and Marketing automation.

Personalized Employee Portals

The Astea AllianceEnterprise Personal Portal provides a single view of the enterprise, crossing traditional functional silos in order to improve job effectiveness and enhance the end-customer's experience. Employees can securely search, navigate and categorize distributed content, and personalize their experience. They can use the portal to accomplish a wide range of tasks including tracking the sales process from lead inception to closure, increasing the visibility of the entire customer exchange, and automating the contract process to electronically manage document sharing throughout the company.

Customer Portal

The Astea AllianceEnterprise Customer Portal enables companies to provide their customers with controlled access in order to open orders, shipments and payments through a fully secured Web portal. In addition, users can access a wide variety of account information including call logs, and service agreements at any time of the day, providing a low-cost, easy-access, low-touch alternative to address any customer service needs. Used as an additional support channel, this portal provides a direct benefit that ensures customers are getting the information they need, when they need it.

Knowledgebase Portal

The Astea AllianceEnterprise Knowledgebase Portal provides a single point of access to information from many sources worldwide. This enables employees and customers to have access to distributed content as if that information resided in one location. The Knowledgebase provides faster, easier access to relevant data enabling companies to get more value out of their information assets, improve customer service and loyalty, and reduce redundancies in information stores. The provision of fast and comprehensive access to documents enhances the speed, efficiency and quality of everyday operations. Astea AllianceEnterprise Knowledgebase Portal supports many item formats, including Adobe Acrobat PDF, HTML, and Microsoft Exchange messages.

Multi-Channel Contact Center

Astea AllianceEnterprise Contact Center is a multi-channel customer service solution that enables call center personnel to easily resolve service requests, deliver consistent service, minimize operational costs, and cross-sell using intuitive, personalized role-based portals. The software enables companies to efficiently capture, track, manage, escalate, and resolve customer service or support requests - and to identify new sales opportunities. The solution supports all CTI, e-mail, fax, phone, and Web chat communications to serve customers anytime, anywhere. It provides call-center employees access to marketing recommendations, campaign information, and customer profiles.

Marketing

Astea AllianceEnterprise Marketing gives enterprises the information and process workflow management they need to analyze their customers' lifecycles, identify diverse opportunities, and maximize the most profitable relationships. Core capabilities of the Astea AllianceEnterprise Marketing application include:

Campaign Management: Plan and execute multi-stage, event-triggered targeted marketing campaigns. Astea enables coordination across outbound email, online seminars, advertising, inbound and outbound telemarketing, web personalization, event marketing, online lead capture and more. AllianceEnterprise V.6 is designed to optimize relationships, not simply automate efforts. A closed-loop solution, it includes measurement of effectiveness of marketing investment.
List Management: Precisely segment customers and prospects to build highly targeted lists for focused marketing activities. Provides a cohesive view of contacts, prospects and customers, linked to warranty, contract, and service information, in order to automatically identify cross- and up-sell opportunities.
Prospect Management: All leads reside in a single, common database, enabling marketing and sales to coordinate efforts. Provides support of sales funnels to trigger activities and efforts across functions and personnel as prospects move toward becoming customers, shortening sales cycles and improving close rates.
Script Management: Develop effective telemarketing campaigns through the use of flexible, customer-focused scripts.
"We believe this technology architecture catapults Astea ahead of the competition," continued Zack Bergreen, president and chief executive officer, Astea. "The introduction of this product culminates a corporate wide effort, delivering world-renowned functionality already inherently found within the Astea solution in a more accessible vehicle."

Availability

Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6 Web-based and Portal functionality such as Personalized Employee Portals, Customer Portal and Knowledgebase will be available end of Q3 2002. Astea AllianceEnterprise V.6 Marketing and Multi-Channel Call Center applications are expected to be generally available to customers by the end-year, 2002. For more information, please contact the Astea sales organization by phone 1-800-347-7334, e-mail info@astea.com or on the web at www.astea.com.

About Astea International

Astea International Inc. (www.astea.com) is a global supplier of integrated Customer Relationship Management (CRM) solutions that provide service-centric companies with a rapid return on their technology investment. Astea's flagship product, AllianceEnterprise CRM Suite, integrates, automates and streamlines sales and service business processes, thereby increasing productivity, competitive advantage, customer focus, top-line revenue growth and profitability. The full module set includes Sales & Marketing, Contact Center, Field Service, Professional Services and Mobile CRM solutions. Extending relationship from the field to the front office, the Company offers over twenty years of domain expertise, linking disparate business organizations and collapsing the time from contract to cash. Astea AllianceEnterprise manages the entire customer lifecycle from generating leads, to closing sales to providing world-class support that drives business.

(c)2002 Astea International Inc. Astea, Astea Alliance Pocket PC and Astea AllianceEnterprise Suite are trademarks of Astea International Inc. All other company and product names contained herein are trademarks of the respective holders.
This press release contains forward-looking statements that are made under the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could materially affect future results. Among these risk factors are possibilities that the companies mentioned in this press release may not purchase licenses for AllianceEnterprise, the continuing acceptance of Astea's products, general competitive pressures in the marketplace, and continued overall growth in the customer relationship management solutions industry. Further information regarding these as well as other key risk factors and meaningful cautionary statements that could affect the Company's financial results are included at length in the Company's Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2001, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.




 
Editorial Contact:
Joe Mitchell
Gregory FCA
610 642 8253
joe@gregoryfca.com
 
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