Broadbase Software Inc is taking its customer management software to market, seeking to raise $50m in an IPO being underwritten by Deutsche Bank. Broadbase’s analytic applications operate on customer data from web site traffic or other front and back office applications and can be used to identify new opportunities and trends. It’s being used by 80 customers in technology, retail, finance, manufacturing, internet and other markets. Broadbase lost $11.34m on $3.43m revenue in 1998 and has 94 employees. It lost $4.57m on sales of $1.48m in the March quarter.
Broadbase started life in November 1995 and spent two years building its products. It licensed EPM/Foundation, designed to enable organizations to build and manage datamarts to analyze customer information, in the first quarter of 1998. In the third quarter of 1998, it began selling EPM applications designed to operate with EPM/Foundation for analyzing customer relationship management data. In May 1999, it introduced Broadbase EPM applications designed for internet applications.
International sales were 5.1% of its total revenue in 1998 and 31.5% of first quarter revenue, most of which comprised sales of EPM/Foundation in Japan. Hewlett-Packard Co accounted for 10% of revenue in 1998 and 14% in the first quarter of 1999. Sales through indirect distribution channels accounted for approximately 28.7% of revenue for 1998 and 52% for the three months of 1999. Indus integrates EPM/Foundation into enterprise solutions for the energy and utility industries and accounted for 18.4% of 1998 revenue and 11.5% in the first quarter of 1999.
The competition is Epiphany and other consulting services-based analysis solutions; web site analysis application vendors including Accrue, Andromedia and Net Perceptions; as well as in- house systems. Broadbase uses Brio Technology’s reporting software – its license runs out in June 2000 – and Intersolv for connecting to relational databases. That agreement runs out in December 2000. It claims to have relationships with Andersen Consulting, Cambridge Technology Partners, Condor/DST, Ernst & Young, Renaissance Worldwide and Technology Solutions Company.
