Comergent 6.3 Extends PRM Suite Capabilities
Comergent 6.3 has new price optimization, search and auction capabilities, said Tom Mescall, senior vice president of marketing and business development at the company, based here.
WHAT'S NEW IN COMERGENT 6.3
>> Invoicing and auction applications
>> Capability to search across modules
>> Support for volume-discount pricing
>> Coupons
>> New e-commerce functionality
Before the update, Comergent already offered lead management, parts diagram, configuration, order status and order change capabilities across the demand-chain management spectrum.
The new auction feature will enable a manufacturer to price goods according to order size, applying volume discounts as needed, Mescall said. Comergent 6.3 supports open- or closed-bid auctions, as well as several types of promotional pricing, including free products, product upgrades and special freight offers.
Bob Olwig, vice president of business development at Worldwide Technology, a St. Louis-based solution provider specializing in e-procurement, said he's particularly interested in Comergent 6.3's new search capabilities. "This is more than a Google-type search across all the modules. It will help our customers find the products they're looking for," he said.
Worldwide Technology uses Comergent as its de facto front-office application in interactions with customers such as integrator Computer Sciences Corp. (CSC), Olwig said. The new features in Comergent 6.3 will give customers such as Worldwide Technology the flexibility to adapt to changing markets, he added.
At Comergent, the size of the average sale is about $500,000 and "holding steady," Mescall said.
The company is strong in the automotive and industrial manufacturing segments, where vendors deal with hundreds,or even thousands,of small equipment suppliers and need the ability to track parts numbers and inventories across firewalls, he said. The Comergent software is built on the J2EE framework.
"PRM is critical for large companies that know exactly who their customers and partners are," Mescall said, adding that partners range from dealers and franchisees to resellers and suppliers with which a given company must share inventory, order and service information.