Empirix Updates e-TEST for .NET
Empirix launched the latest version of its Web application testing solution, e-TEST suite 7.0. e-TEST suite 7.0 is the first complete native .NET Web application testing solution. e-TEST suite 7.0 allows QA organizations to adapt to new technologies through wizard-driven support for all major features of the .NET Web application stack.

			Required Reading
		Predicting Customer Behavior with the Growth/Defection Model    How profitable would your business be if you could predict what your customers would do next, using the large amounts of customer data already collected? With this capability, you would be able to apply treatment strategies to grow customers, save those at risk of defection and ultimately increase your profits by tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars every year. Unfortunately, this is not easy. It is very difficult for most companies today to determine which customers either grew their business or left the company, let alone predict such future behavior. It's difficult, yet possible. more >>
Archive of past Required Reading articles

Plow & Hearth Selects Alpine Access
Alpine Access announced that it had expanded its services to Plow & Hearth, a wholly owned subsidiary of 1-800-FLOWERS.COM. Alpine Access was originally engaged for overflow call support during 1-800-FLOWERS.COM's three peak holiday seasons - Valentine's Day, Mother's Day and Christmas. Over the past 18 months, Alpine Access' scope of work has grown to include inbound sales support throughout the year, as well as managing inbound customer service calls.

ServiceWare to Provide Support to EADS TELECOM
ServiceWare announced that it has won a contract to provide ServiceWare Enterprise to EADS TELECOM's Customer Support Center. EADS TELECOM needed to find a solution that could help them ramp up more quickly and streamline their service and support initiatives. They selected ServiceWare Enterprise for use by their internal support center agents who, in turn, support their field support engineers, customers and resellers. They also later plan to deploy ServiceWare Self-Service for their customers and resellers and ServiceWare Field Service to their field engineers. ServiceWare Enterprise will be integrated with Remedy, the company's call tracking system.

Datamonitor Report on Call Center Outsourcing
Research from Datamonitor concludes that the fear of job losses from the US to Latin America is much ado about nothing. In a new report entitled, "Call Center Outsourcing in Latin America and the Caribbean to 2008", Datamonitor reveals that 12,900 customer service positions are outsourced from the United States and Europe into Latin America. To put this into perspective, there are 2.86mn call center agent positions in the United States. Only a fraction, 10,600 (0.4%) are outsourced from the United States to Latin America - mainly from financial services, telecommunications and technology firms. By 2008 Datamonitor expects 25,100 APs - still just 0.9% of the US AP total - to be outsourced from the United States to Latin America.

ExactTarget Receives Award
ExactTarget was honored with the Gazelle Award at the TechPoint MIRA Awards. TechPoint honors emerging companies annually with their MIRA Awards to celebrate and publicize Indiana's top technology companies, products and individuals. The Gazelle award is delivered to the leading technology company in business less than three years from the initial commercialization of its principal products or services. ExactTarget launched its email marketing solution three years ago and experienced growth rates exceeding 1,200 percent in 2002 and 320 percent in 2003.   (about ExactTarget)