Telemanagement Industry NEWS Letter from THE ERGOTEC GROUP

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April 15, 2003

Happy Tax Day in the United States!

Of course Tax Day for corporations was a month ago, and most publicly traded telemanagement firms have reported their 2002 results by now. (Complete details of this will be available in Chapter 6: Investment Issues in our forthcoming market report, Telemanagement Applications Industry 2002.)

So what good news is there to report in the industry? Check our updated Industry News page at www.ErgotecGroup.com (There’s some bad news in the business, and reported at our web site, too, but I’d rather focus on the positive, for now.)

Here are a few points of good news:

Broad:Margin Attracts $21 Million

Real venture capital – from ABS Capital and Concert Capital going into a real telemanagement firm in 2003 – this is the first significant investment in this space in more than two years. Broad:Margin’s invoice management application is part of the hottest area in enterprise telemanagement; the company also provides revenue assurance and other services to network services providers. That’s the kind of venture capital seen only once before in this industry.

Direct Insite Nearly Doubled Revenues in 2002

This stealthy new competitor, also in the invoice management space, announced today that revenues grew some 96% last year to $7.4 million. It doesn’t hurt that IBM Global Services is their largest distribution partner. And they’re not completely stealthy: the company trades NASDAQ under symbol DIRI. But you’ve got to scroll to page 13 to see the news.

John Kaiser Moves to Dictaphone

Now VP of Marketing at Dictaphone’s Communications Recording Systems Group, Kaiser has not only held senior management positions at competitors Verint Systems and e-talk Corporation, but got the biggest boost of his career after leading marketing at call accounting systems vendor Summa Four (now a division of Atcomm). Dictaphone is best-known, perhaps, for its medical recording and transcription systems, but its CRS division, which records telephone calls, is the “revenue market share leader for voice recording in North America.”

M.I.T. Gets Smart, Admits Colin Jones to Class of 2008!

That’s right, our own Ergotec research assistant, got the Fat Envelope (but it comes by phone now) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He’s deferring entry for at least a year so he can take advantage of a full scholarship to Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in Chongqing (China) starting this summer. We won’t miss him though; he’s going to continue to work part-time for us via Fat Pipe (broadband connection) from his luxury college apartment. Further, I’ll have to keep paying him in US dollar$, not China yuan (about eight to the dollar). Per hour, he’ll earn 30 times what a typical Chinese college student would get.

Stump the Chump:

Someone asked me: “How long are businesses required to archive telephone records and call accounting reports?” Usually I know answers to such questions. In this case: Dunno.

If you think you know the answer to this question, please e-mail me with what you know. (I have a feeling that there are as many answers to this question as there are lawyers who have an opinion.)

But if you have question about this industry … e-mail me, or call 360 357-1000.

Wishing you good news in your life and business.

-- Dan Stusser

P.S. Now you can go to one place to catch up on news at www.ErgotecGroup.com! Our humble but updated web site consolidates news about telemanagement applications – and is becoming the industry portal. At least we’re trying to make it that. Please send your comments and suggestions.

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