Today’s big news is that HP is dropping Siebel CRM now owned by Oracle in favor of Salesforce.com.
It’s a bit unfortunate that this is presented in the context of personal ego wars – unfortunate, but understandable, considering that Oracle has been on a warpath with HP ever since former CEO Hurd got ousted, in fact they launched a global manhunt for incoming HP CEO Leo Apotheker. But ego clashes make good stories.
That said, the real story is that According to Trip Chowdhry of Global Equities Research “by moving to Salesforce, HPQ may be saving 40-50% over ORCL Siebel.” So egos aside, it’s a pure business decision, and not a surprising one. (Well, talk about surprise and personalities, the “other CRM” system not even mentioned is SAP – long time Alma Mater of current HP CEO Apotheker. Hm… I suspect economics win over loyalty)
Clearly it’s a major victory for Salesforce.com and yet another It’s yet another proof point that SaaS Continues to Strenghten in the Enterprise.
