CRM: Case File - Tata Motors: Toward Better Service

Tata Motors-one of India's largest integrated automaker with
over 60% of a market share in the commercial vehicles and 20% of India's
passenger car market-has one million customers, 22,000 employees, and annual
sales of approximately $3 bn in commercial vehicles, utility vehicles, and
passenger cars.

The company implemented Oracle's Siebel Automotive-a
comprehensive CRM solution. To address competitive challenges, Tata Motors began
standardizing its customer-facing business processes companywide, laying the
foundation for stronger dealer relationships, improved operational efficiency
and effectiveness, and a better customer experience. This posed numerous
challenges, as it involved working with 500 dealer organizations and more than
1,600 locations staffed with more than 10,000 salespeople across India, said
head of CRM and DMS Project, Tata Motors, KR Sreenivasan.

In tune with its reengineering effort, Tata deployed a
technology platform to improve the flow of information across the enterprise.
The platform consisted of an innovative DMS, which helped individual dealerships
with everything from inventory management and credit reporting to calculating
commissions, and Siebel Automotive. By tightly integrating Siebel Automotive and
its DMS, the company was able to streamline transactions and ensure that dealers
capture customer data as a part of their normal operations.

"Siebel Automotive has transformed our organization and made it truly customer-centric" -KR Sreenivasan, head of CRM and DMS Project, Tata Motors

"Integrating Siebel Automotive with our dealer management
system ensured that our dealers would immediately see the value in the
solution," Sreenivasan explained. "This has helped us overcome the
usual resistance to change and gain rapid acceptance from our dealers."

Phased Approach

The company took a phased approach to the implementation, with the goal of
achieving success in each phase before moving forward. Phase I, currently under
way, focuses on capturing customer and vehicle data and automating routine
tasks. Phase II will focus on leveraging data to improve customer interactions
and streamlining product development and planning. Phase III will focus on
tuning the system and delivering additional value-added services to customers.

Siebel Automotive has been closely integrated with a wide array
of SAP back-office applications, including applications inventory management,
fulfillment, and parts location. Pricing and tax calculations are adjusted for
each dealer's requirements. In addition, comprehensive sales and reporting
functionality built into Siebel Automotive enabled Tata to distribute sales
targets to its dealers and roll up sales numbers across the country.

Sreenivasan said, "Siebel's proven SAP connector was a
key factor in our decision-making." The company also favored Siebel
Automotive because, he explained, "The user-friendly interface simplified
the process of training of Tata Motors' 10,000-plus dealer sales force."
Covering a country with an area of 3.3 mn sq km also required an innovative
communications solution.

On the Success Road

Sreenivasan claimed, "Overall, Siebel Automotive has transformed our
organization and made it truly customer-centric...We've overcome the
challenges of relying on disparate sources of information, as well as having
inconsistent business processes. Today, our employees and dealers are much more
responsive and can serve customers more efficiently and effectively-drawing
upon real-time, centralized customer and vehicle data."

He further said that the solution helped dealers respond to
customer queries regarding vehicles that aren't in a dealer's stock, but
which can be ordered directly from Tata Motors.

"Within the first year of implementing the solution, we are
targeting improvements of 5 to 10 % in customer satisfaction, revenue growth,
operating cost reduction, and productivity gains," says Sreenivasan. He
expressed optimism that these numbers will increase considerably over time, with
the implementation of the solution.

Team DQ

maildqindia@cybermedia.co.in