Pegasystems Inc., a provider of customer service software to major financial services organizations, said it has entered into a joint marketing agreement with Sun Microsystems Inc.
The agreement lets Pegasystems piggyback on Sun's global sales network while delivering software on Sun's Ultra Enterprise client-server networks.
The deal is also likely to raise Pegasystems' profile just as demand is surging for customer service, call center management, error resolution, and other capabilities that the Cambridge, Mass., vendor supports.
Pegasystems made a $4 million initial public stock offering in July. With the Sun alliance and other moves to be announced, "my job is now to get Pegasystems away from being one of the best-kept secrets," said director of sales Peter Watson.
The company, which announced its alliance at the American Bankers Association's bank card conference in Orlando, is especially strong in credit cards; Citicorp's South Dakota subsidiary and Barclays Bank of London's Barclaycard are among its clients. Another major U.S. card-related contract will soon be announced, Mr. Watson said.
Pegasystems, with annual worldwide sales of $36 million, also serves retail banks, mutual funds, and international money transfer operations, which have complex investigation and resolution needs.
Mr. Watson described Pegasystems' offering as "an integrated backbone to support customer service." It combines "front-end" receipt of questions or requests via phone, Internet, or mail with "back-end resolution of problems or disputes" through rules-based software procedures.
Sun Microsystems, a leader in workstation technology and programming advances like Java, will jointly market "the most comprehensive customer management solution for the financial services industry," said Rob Hall, the Silicon Valley company's vice president, worldwide financial services.
He said Pegasystems is suited to "organizations with global operations (that) must manage customer interactions in different languages, time zones, currencies, geographies, and regulatory environments ... . Together, we empower banks to service customers in new ways by using technologies such as Pegasystems' automated workflow and Sun's Java technology and the Internet."
"The Sun platform enables Pegasystems to deliver highly scaleable client-server solutions that are extremely cost-effective," said Pegasystems president and founder Alan Trefler. "We are impressed with the performance and mission-critical robustness of Pegasystems' solutions on the Sun platform."
