Tokyo Electron America, Inc. goes live with Metrix to complete their full-function Customer Support Center

Waukesha, WI -April 17, 2000 - Tokyo Electron America, Inc. (TEA) has completed installation, setup, and testing of Metrix's innovative customer support center software, Metrix 4.1. The company is a subsidiary of Japan-based Tokyo Electron Limited (TEL), a leading global manufacturer of semiconductor production equipment. The TEA Customer Support Center (CSC) went live with Metrix in February, 2000.

According to Terry Ansohn, Customer Support Applications Manager, the phenomenal growth of the company's service operation necessitated TEA finding a more efficient and customer-focused system with which to manage product service. "Our goal has always been to maintain the highest standards for customer service in terms of response time and warranty fulfillment," explains Ansohn. "With 26 support center agents, over 400 field service and process engineers, and an installed base of more than 3300 machines throughout the United States, we needed a system that would allow us to fully automate our customer support operations."

Metrix 4e is specifically designed to fill the gap for product service in enterprise-wide customer relationship management (CRM) systems, combining deep functionality and the power of the Internet with a component-based N-tier architecture for 100-percent inventory visibility, real-time tracking and superior service. Key features of the Metrix 4e software include configurable web self-service, mobile database synchronization, a configurable schedule board, and global repair center functionality. It enables automated contract renewals, advance replace, reverse logistics, and accelerated rollout of integrated web strategies. Metrix 4e also offers highly customizable workflow features.

The ability to customize Metrix 4e to meet TEA's needs was one of the primary reasons they chose Metrix. "Metrix offered us the greatest functionality 'out of the box' of any system we looked at," Ansohn says. "In particular, the software's contract management capabilities provided a wide variety of features that were very configurable in order to meet our specific needs."

Those needs include the ability to track or monitor service response time as well as customer satisfaction issues. "Metrix provides our dispatchers with on-screen information," Ansohn reports. "Monitoring any escalation in service requests is critical to our ability to address customers' service needs in a timely fashion."

Metrix gives customers capabilities for management of their service dispatch and tracking functions with core modules of Repair Center & Inventory, Contracts & Warranties, and Support Center. "We're pleased to be able to provide Tokyo Electron America with a solution which is enabling them to achieve their goals and objectives for customer care. It takes software that is designed for product-oriented companies to effectively manage call center requirements for businesses such as TEA. It is an honor to continue to build on our relationships with high-tech and durable goods companies. This is what enables Metrix to further our core competency and leadership in providing superior software solutions to the product service industry," says Larry Laux, president and CEO, Metrix, Inc.

TEA's field service engineers will soon take customer service to the next level when the company completes testing of Metrix's innovative Techlink^TM module. "Techlink will give our field personnel real-time access to customer records, including service history, contract and warranty entitlements, as well as parts availability," Ansohn says. "It will also make possible immediate recording of all specifics of the service call - from time of arrival to actual service performed."