Company: AdvancedEMedia
Headquarters: Aliso Viejo, Calif.
Technology Sector: Software
Key Product: WebJaguar E-business Suite
Year Founded: 2001
Number of Channel Partners: 25 in U.S.
Ideal Channel Partner: Small business-focused solution providers
Why You Should Care: AdvancedEMedia's WebJaguar e-commerce platform is a cost-effective stepping stone for companies that have outgrown basic solutions and want customization for specific scenarios. The company is also in the midst of a channel partner recruitment effort.
The Lowdown: E-commerce platform vendor AdvancedEMedia is using customization and a strong channel focus to differentiate itself from the pack in the increasingly crowded software as a service space.
Aliso Viejo, Calif.-based AdvancedEMedia makes the WebJaguar E-business Suite, a collection of hosted modules and applications that help companies hawk their wares online. WebJaguar is based on Java and MySQL, making it easily customizable for a wide range of vertical industry scenarios, and this flexibility has enabled the company to attract a loyal following of customers, according to Bachir Kassir, founder and president of AdvancedEMedia.
"Without customization we'd lose at least 50 percent of our customer base. Instead of developing a solution from scratch, customers can tailor WebJaguar to fit their business needs," said Kassir.
AdvancedEMedia began selling WebJaguar in 2004 and now has more than 450 customers using the platform. The company currently does about half its business through the channel, which consists of 12 active channel partners in the U.S. However, AdvancedEMedia is in the midst of a partner recruitment effort aimed at "aggressively growing" the program, with a goal of adding at least 20 new partners in the coming year, Kassir said.
In addition to giving partners leads, AdvancedEMedia offers VARs commission of between 10 percent and 20 percent for recurring business, and a 30 percent setup fee for new customers. Partners can also offer WebJaguar to their clients under a white-label arrangement, Kassir said.
WebJaguar ranges from $5,000 on the low end to $20,000 for the full-featured version. This puts it in the realm of more established SaaS vendors, and Kassir acknowledges that AdvancedEMedia occasionally runs into competition from NetSuite on e-commerce deals. More often, though, customers develop interest in WebJaguar once they've begun to outgrow basic e-commerce offerings like Yahoo Store and realize the need for more flexibility, said Kassir.
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