Genesys Labs Targets International Expansion with First M&A Deal since May 2002

By ROBERT LIU
TMCnet Wireless and Technology Columnist

Marking its first major acquisition in more than three years, Alcatel on Wednesday announced it has acquired GMK, a leading provider of contact center voice self-service solutions in Brazil, to complement its wholly owned Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories subsidiary.

Although GMK will officially be merged into the parent company’s Alcatel Telecomunicações S.A subsidiary in Brazil, GMK will initially be rebranded GMK Genesys to leverage its brand recognition and local goodwill. Based in Sao Paulo, GMK was founded in 1984 and currently employs about 100 workers. Those employees will be absorbed by Genesys.

“By acquiring GMK, we are significantly expanding our presence in the Brazilian contact center market,” Wes Hayden, president and CEO of Genesys, said in a prepared statement.

The deal represents the first major acquisition since May 2002 when Alcatel bought Telera on behalf of Genesys for $136 million. Terms of the GMK deal weren’t disclosed. But while the Telera deal served Genesys Labs from a technology standpoint by jumpstarting its VoiceXML development (which was vital at the time), the latest M&A transaction serves a different purpose: international expansion.

“Genesys has definitely targeted international expansion with Brazil as one of our top priorities,” explained David Radoff, company spokesman. In addition to Brazil, Genesys has targeted Russia, China and India as its top four international priorities, he said.

GMK currently has market-leading positions in the Brazilian voice self-service and interactive voice response (IVR) markets. The company serves more than 100 customers in the financial services and outsourcing sectors.

“Working closely with the entire management team, we will strongly support the GMK customer base and expand our own investment in Brazil to provide the scale and presence to best serve this market,” Hayden said.

Additionally, the GMK deal serves Genesys Labs’ strategic objectives set forth a year ago to refocus its efforts on vertical markets, particularly financial services. That strategy came to fruition last October, for example, when the company announced Banco Rió, a subsidiary of Banco Santander in Argentina, as a major new customer but since then organic growth has been slow. With GMK, Genesys has now established a foothold with 17 of the top 20 banks in Brazil, Radoff told TMCnet in an email exchange.

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Robert Liu is Executive Editor at TMCnet. Previously, he was Executive Editor at Jupitermedia and has also written for CNN, A&E, Dow Jones and Bloomberg. For more articles, please visit Robert Liu's columnist page.

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