Assetlink set for big leap

PUNE, INDIA: Marketing Operations Management (MOM) specialist Assetlink is working on attacking campaign management, lead management and direct marketing as the uncovered ground that will beef up its portfolio ahead.

"Depending on what we hear from our customers and how the market evolves, we are definitely moving in this direction and will hook the same to CRM systems," shared Sunita Shetty, director, marketing.

Besides the above areas, immediate in the pipeline is a move towards solution sets besides adding fixes and features to current version of its flagship Assetlink 5.7.

"We are working on providing specific solution sets like for marketing services or brand management that will involve multiple modules," she added. There would also be changes in architecture in future developments.

Assetlink is a leading player in a new application category, the MOM, which is also referred to by some as Enterprise Marketing Management (EMM) or Marketing Resource Management (MRM).

Gartner defines MRM as a set of processes and capabilities that help companies optimize and orchestrate their marketing resources.

According to Gartner's 2007 report on MRM Magic Quadrant, Aprimo was slotted as the top MRM player followed by Assetlink, said to be very close to becoming a leader in a year or two.

Next in the line was Unica, tagged as the biggest fish in MRM EMM space, after acquiring MarketingCentral.

Assetlink's application has been reported as the most comparable to Aprimo's, while according to Gartner, Unica is slowly expanding from its core competency of campaign management.

"They're both going to be interesting to watch. I'm thinking we'll have another leader within a year or two," Kimberly Collins, research vice president at Gartner had said earlier as per a news report at SearchCRM.com.

However, Shetty refutes any ambitions of eyeing the No.1 slot. "We are not looking at that position. We want to be small, flexible and the best in the MOM space."

Gartner also named SAP, Unica and Oracle's Siebel product as challengers in the market, and SAS, Assetlink, Citat, Elateral and BrandWizard as visionaries.

Talking about big fishes like Oracle with suites like Siebel and Peoplesoft and the overlap with CRM market Shetty said, "We have long fought to find the right spot and fight with the mindset about CRM. In fact the very definition of MOM has been fiddled with terms like MRM or EMM. But we stick to the MOM definition. Big guys are waiting to see how will this market play out. They are sitting in the MOM market but do not cover everything. They will jump in at some time, in one way or other."

Commenting on possible consolidation that may play out of this big versus small equation, she added, "It's always up in the air, but we have no plans for now."

The company's geographies are the US, Europe, South Africa, Australia and Asia while verticals like FMCG, financial services and telecom are the top ones.

It sees India as still an immature market but expects a pick-up in India in the next 12 to 13 months. Its customers include Colgate-Palmolive, Nestle, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Caterpillar etc.

The company has around 70 people in its development base at Pune.