ALPHATECH INDIA LIMITED: B2B

CUSTOMER RETENTION
Case Background
Alphatech India ltd., a subsidiary of Alphatech Corporation, a
market leader in providing technology for AIMS
Alphatech had the largest market share in AIMS market globally
& also in India, but lately its market share dropped from 65% in
2009 to 60% in 2011
Zeta Corporation being the closest competitor was giving hard
time to Alphatech with competing technology for most of
Alphatechs offerings
Alphatech had been providing IT support to Neptune, an Indian
project consultancy for over 5 years
Neptune was looking for vendors to upgrade its existing
Alphatech AIMS
After some negotiations Alphatech got the order but later on with
a new appointment of new Director, Neptune looked inclined
towards giving Zeta corporation a chance to test its offerings
Neptune Alphatech Deal
Neptune had been using Alphatech technology based AIMS
since 2005 & awarded the deal to upgrade their AIMS to
Alphatech in 2010
Alphatech was offering to complete the job for Rs. 105 million
after giving a 30% discount on list price
Srikant Das, Alphatechs sales manager- north region
handled the deal
Later due to budgetary constraints, Neptune postponed the
implementation for 2 years
In December 2012 when Das approached the newly
appointed Director-IT at Neptune, Das got a very meek
response from him & was left confused
Later Das found that Swami, Director-IT was considering Zeta
as an option rather than closing the deal
Neptune Management
Satish
Gopakumar
(Managing
Director)
Venkat
Ramamurthy
(Director User
Dept.)
Harish Swami
(Director IT)
Rajeev
Srivastava
(General
Manger, IT)
Swami & Rajeev both joined
Neptune in December 2011
Das met with both Harish
Swami & Rajeev Srivastava
for following up on the deal
While Harish Swami showed
less interest, Rajeev seemed
satisfied with Alphatechs
proposal
Rajeevs promotion was
dependent upon his
feedback from Swami, so he
could not go against Swami
Das had good rapport with
Venkat Ramamurthy
Key Concerns
Alphatech was still offering to provide the solutions at price quoted in 2010
even after price fluctuations
Still Swami was inclined towards testing Zetas offerings and was
postponing closure of the deal & Das was informed about the same by
Rajeev
Although Alphatech got the deal as their offering were technologically
superior than that of Zeta, further postponement could work against
Alphatech as Zeta would get more time to advance its offerings
Swami was amongst the decision makers, so Das had to get him on board
to close the deal
Das rejecting Xions (its implementation partner which also worked with
Zeta) proposal might have worked against Alphatech
Purchase Portfolio Matrix for
Neptune
Leverage
Items
(raw materials)
Criticals
(new technology)
Generics
(MRO items)
Bottleneck
Items
(essential spare parts)
High
CUSTOMER
VALUE
Low
Low CUSTOMER RISK High
AIMS
implementa
tion was a
big &
critical
project for
Neptune
They were
looking to
minimizing
cost via
getting the
best quality
Zetas
offerings
were
competitive
Recommendations
Das should first try to understand what prompted Swami to suddenly consider
Zetas proposal by talking to Rajeev or other employees & then communicate
the advantages of going ahead with Alphatech to Swami
Alphatechs products were already superior than that of Zeta & Neptune was
already using Alphatechs Aims so the total cost of ownership would be less if
Neptune goes with Alphatech, as training & other costs would be less
Das should explain this to Neptune & try to convince them to consider T.C.O
rather than initial price
Das should leverage his rapport with Venkat to gain trust of Swami & try to
close the deal as soon as possible
Thank You