SEATTLE -- The Cobalt Group, a provider of customer relationship management (CRM) and e-business software and services to the auto retail market, acquired certain assets of automotive software provider Auto Town. Cobalt will integrate Auto Town F&I 3.0 into Cobalt Prospector, its CRM solution, to provide new desking and F&I capabilities.

With the addition of Auto Town F&I 3.0, dealers can use Cobalt Prospector through every phase of a customer's car buying process. It can be used to capture customer and prospect information from walk-ins, phone calls, or the Internet, move the prospect through the sales and financing process, conduct the negotiation, perform the trade appraisal, finance the purchase, and record the sale in the dealership's accounting system. The solution automatically schedules all follow-up activities, and it is entirely Web-based. Coordinating with the dealership accounting system, it automatically captures valuable financial data and hands the deal off electronically from the salesperson to the sales manager to the F&I manager. It presents financing options to the customer and records the entire deal.

The combination of Auto Town F&I 3.0 and Prospector lets dealers to flow customer data directly into the F&I process without tedious and costly rekeying of data. Auto Town dealers said that the time needed to finance and complete a purchase is cut from over an hour to less than 20 minutes, reducing the time the customer spends in the F&I office and greatly increasing customer satisfaction.

"Customers don't want to spend hours in the dealership waiting for F&I numbers," said Jerry Daniels, executive vice president of the Coggin Automotive Group.

For more information about Cobalt Prospector, contact Cobalt at (866)439-2258 or e-mail sales@cobaltgroup.com.