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ResponseTek Secures Second Round Funding to Expand Global Marketing, Distribution Capabilities in Customer Experience Management Market ResponseTek Networks Corp., a leading supplier of Customer Experience Management (CEM) solutions, today announced that it has closed a $1.8 million Canadian round of financing led by existing venture capitalist firms the Working Opportunity Fund, managed by GrowthWorks Capital Ltd., and the Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC).ResponseTek will use this new capital to expand its global marketing and distribution capabilities in Canada, the U.S. and the U.K. and continue to extend its offering to capture customer, vendor and employee experiences and allow organizations to improve. “Companies have spent billions implementing traditional CRM systems only to know less than what they did before,” said Esteban Kolsky, senior research analyst at Gartner. “CRM ends when the interaction with the customer ends so customer experience is what ultimately creates the highly prized relationship and reputation. All interactions, whether via a Web site, call center, field engineer or billing department give customers the opportunity to form an opinion – good or bad. Companies are now looking for technology to fill this gap, garner those experiences of customers, tap into these opinions and address "real" issues (like product and service quality, and process challenges) that would otherwise have been overlooked.” “ResponseTek has a unique product well positioned to capture a significant share of the untapped customer experience management market worldwide,” said Syed Hasan, president and CEO of ResponseTek. “The market is being formalized as the need for customer experience to drive decision-making continues to grow. We have been successful because our technology not only fills the gap of accessing customer experience information, but also enables it to be provided throughout the organization in real-time. ResponseTek has built tremendous value into the business and is poised to reap the benefits of market leadership.” ResponseTek solutions include: ? Customer Experience Management (CEM) provides key decision-makers with the ability to constantly manage customer satisfaction levels by incorporating the customer voice into business decisions in real-time. ? Vendor Performance Management (VPM) allows an organization to closely manage the product and service quality supplied by its vendors, providing security for the organization and offering a differentiating value proposition for vendors. ? Employee Experience Management (EEM) provides employees with a voice to drive organizational improvements and allows management to maintain and nourish internal relationships with the employees. Jim Charlton, senior vice president of GrowthWorks Capital said, “We are delighted to reinvest in ResponseTek with its unique strengths. We look forward to continuing our work with the experienced ResponseTek management team to sustain its position as a global market leader.” ABOUT GROWTHWORKS GrowthWorks* (www.growthworks.ca) is a recognized leader in venture capital fund management with proven experience in the raising, investing and managing of capital. GrowthWorks? managed funds, including the Working Opportunity Fund and GrowthWorks Canadian Fund, have a combined $750 million in assets. GrowthWorks has a team of skilled and knowledgeable investment professionals with a combined 200 years of experience. The Investment team has a proven track record of identifying, structuring and negotiating investments in companies in emerging sectors. GrowthWorks is a registered trademark of GrowthWorks Capital Ltd. *GrowthWorks refers to affiliates of GrowthWorks Ltd. ABOUT BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT BANK OF CANADA (BDC) BDC Venture Capital (www.bdc.ca) is a major venture capital investor in Canada, active at every stage of the company's development cycle, from start-up through expansion, with a focus on technology-based businesses that have high growth potential and that are positioned to become dominant players in their markets. BDC Venture Capital has been involved in venture capital since 1975 and has to date invested in more than 400 different companies. It currently manages over $350 million in venture capital assets and more than 80% of its portfolio is invested in the areas of biotechnology, medical and health related technology, telecommunications, information technology and electronics. ABOUT RESPONSETEK Founded in 1999, Vancouver-based ResponseTek Networks Corp. (www.ResponseTek.com) helps quality-driven Fortune 500 firms increase revenue and profit by dramatically reducing customer turnover. Its Customer Experience Management (CEM) software enables firms to continuously improve quality of service based on immediately knowing and acting upon their customers’ experiences. ResponseTek complements traditional CRM systems that focus on client histories, but not individual customer experiences that are critical to creating satisfied, loyal and profitable customers. It provides executives and managers with real-time enterprise-wide visibility into how customers perceive their organization’s performance. Management can then track, analyze and resolve problems by internal groups such as departments, regions or individuals to effectively drive business improvements. Unlike market research firms, ResponseTek’s end-to-end business solutions are designed for multiple stakeholders (customers, employees, partners); route real-time communication feedback directly to the responsible individual/business area where decisions can be made via actionable data; require minimum resource allocation; and operate in multiple environments (Web, wireless devices, IVRs, kiosks, etc.). Among ResponseTek clients are NTL Home, T-Mobile, Abbey, HSBC, Aon, Lastminute.com, Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, Xerox and WestJet. |