CRM, Telephony Combined in Onyx-Avaya Deal In Japan

Avaya (News - Alert) and Onyx Software Corporation have announced that the companies will integrate their respective products for the contact center market in Japan.

Officials of both companies hope that the integration between Onyx, a CRM vendor, and Avaya, a vendor of business communications applications, systems and services, will "enable enterprises to build strategic contact centers quickly and cost-effectively."

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Find Solutions for Enterprises, SMBs & Service Providers at the INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference and EXPO West, September 1-3, 2009. Los Angeles, CA.

Features available to call center operators as a result of this integration include a unified screen and single log-in integrating Avaya’s telephony functions with Onyx’s customer management capabilities for call center agents, pop-up screens that will automatically appear on the agent’s Onyx desktop containing relevant customer information on call receipt or transfer, based on call data retrieved from the Avaya system and reports generated by the integration of call center operation data of Avaya systems with customer/inquiry information of Onyx application.

In Japan, the two companies plan to promote the joint solution through their distributors.

Onyx Software Japan provides Onyx Customer Management. Avaya provides telephony and CTI components through Avaya Interaction Center, which delivers support for advanced multi-channel contacts including web, chat and e-mail, as well as telephone.

Onyx has agreed to be purchased by M2M. Onyx officials recently issued a statement today "responding" to "the recent press releases issued by CDC Software regarding the definitive merger agreement executed between Onyx and M2M Holdings, Inc.

This January the Chinese company CDC Corporation announced its intention to purchase Onyx, and in March announced that CDC Software, a wholly owned subsidiary of CDC Corporation, had “presented a new proposal to the board of directors of Onyx Software for a strategic transaction that would combine Onyx Software with CDC Software.”

But as Reuters reported last week, Onyx rejected the takeover bid by CDC, "saying an agreement to be acquired by privately held M2M Holdings Inc. offers shareholders better value."

An Onyx statement released this past week "reaffirms its support of the all cash transaction with M2M," according to Onyx officials, "unless the Onyx board of directors reasonably determines in good faith, after consultation with its financial advisor and its outside counsel, that the CDC announcement constitutes or would reasonably be expected to lead to a transaction that is superior to the definitive agreement with M2M."

Onyx officials note that CDC’s June 20, 2006 press release described an all cash $4.85 offer, "yet only two days later, CDC has abandoned its all cash offer and now purports to offer Onyx shareholders only a combination of cash and stock, demonstrating CDC’s inconsistent statements and unpredictable behavior." They add that the stock could be trading as low as $4.50 by the time the deal went down, too.

David Sims is contributing editor for TMCnet. For more articles please visit David Sims’ columnist page.

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