A Siebel Action

From: spencer_katt@ziffdavis.com
Sent: Monday, October 11, 2004 12:42 AM
To: eWEEK readers
Subject: Do-re-mi in L.A.; J. Walker in N.Y.

Free cash! Spence spied the perfect antidote to his penurious publishers punishing T&E policies at the Pervasive booth in the South Hall of the Los Angeles Convention Center during Siebel User Week. Pervasive was giving away cheap canvas wallets with money in them—from a single buck to a crisp $20 bill. “Why, in my day they used booth babes to draw you to an exhibit. Not filthy lucre,” fussed the Furball as he flitted off with a fistful of dollars.

Spence never spotted Tom Siebel at the event, who was apparently keeping a low profile. Who could blame him, since many of the companys smaller partners were grumbling that Siebel shows too much favoritism toward IBM Global Services? His Hirsuteness also heard that heads might have rolled at Siebel over Salesforce.com winning Ciscos hosted sales force automation business. The company apparently had to reorient its sales teams to allow its enterprise sales force to sell its CRM OnDemand service. Previously, only its SMB sales force had sold it.

Escaping from Siebelization, Spence skatted to the East Coast to check out TechXNY. The Mouser was amused—but not surprised—to find that the biggest line at any booth in the Javits was for Johnnie Walker, which was there to promote its hooch. The attendees certainly needed a good belt or two after noting that the biggest signs in the hall were for outsourcing companies from Romania, China and the Philippines.

As the libatious Lynx outsourced his happiness to Scotland, he noticed that CAs embattled interim CEO, Ken Cron, seemed barricaded behind an Alamo-like amalgam of teleprompters during his keynote. It figured. In his speech, the cornered Cron never once acknowledged CAs messy accounting scandal but instead extolled the virtues of on-demand computing. “Isnt that Big Blues bag?” pondered the perplexed Puss.

Quitting the keynote, Spence socialized with some attendees who noted that CAs senior vice president of business development, Tommy Bennett, quietly took a severance package and left the company recently. The speculation was whether it was a voluntary resignation or the forced departure of an FOS (Friend of Sanjay).

After witnessing Microsoft and HPs new “Microsoft Across America” RV, a big tech-filled truck intended to travel the country and demo end-to-end solutions to SMBs, the Kitty decided it was time to hit the road, too.

Later, at Manhattans Mad 28, Le Chat chatted with a crony who said Microsoft was just granted U.S. patent 6,800,031 for an online trivia game that allows players to match wits with celebrities like Beyonce or Triumph the Insult Comic Dog. “Nice patent,” the Mouser mused while mimicking Triumphs schtick, “for me to poop on!”