SAN MATEO, Calif. -- BMW North American Sales and BMW Financial Services have deployed Siebel Automotive in their customer contact centers, announced Siebel Systems. BMW has also deployed functionality from Siebel Automotive's Customer- and Vehicle-Centric Service and Integrated Captive Finance solution sets, allowing for a common customer infrastructure across business units.

Previously, both BMW North American Sales and the captive arm had separate, homegrown call centers. When the sales division decided to replace its call center system, the two divisions opted to work together in finding one solution that would meet both their needs and provide a single customer view. They selected Siebel's.

"This (automotive) industry-specific functionality is designed for both manufacturers and captive finance providers," said John Gray, general manager for Siebel Automotive. "(It) enables organizations like BMW to deploy CRM initiatives across business units -- lowering the total cost of ownership."

Now, both units share one customer repository that contains millions of BMW customers. Contact center representatives in both sales and financial services now have full visibility into each customer's total relationship with BMW. A representative, for example, can see that a particular customer has more than one BMW product or maybe a banking relationship with BMW Financial. And BMW can maintain data confidentiality to meet legal requirements.