Higher education institutions are turning to customer relationship management (CRM) technology solutions to differentiate themselves in a bid to compete more aggressively with one another to recruit and retain the right students. The report, CRM in the Higher Education Market by independent market analysts Datamonitor, predicts IT revenue from CRM solutions in the higher education markets of the US, UK, Germany, France and Australia will grow from $184.9 million in 2007 to $324.5 million in 2012.

Over €2.8 billion pounds worth of advertising space on bills and statements lies unused in the major European economies of Germany, France, the UK, Italy and Spain, a new report published by Pitney Bowes reveals. The advertising value of this wasted opportunity is equivalent to 24% of combined annual direct mail spend across the five countries studied.

eGain Communications Corporation, provider of customer service and knowledge management software for in-house or on-demand SaaS deployment, announced that KMWorld named eGain to the 2008 list of "100 Companies that Matter in Knowledge Management". KMWorld's list is selected by knowledge management practitioners, theorists, analysts, vendors, and customers.

Salesforce.com announced the availability of the new Force.com Toolkit for Adobe(r) AIR(TM) and Flex, a new set of tools and services to enable development of Internet applications on salesforce.com's Force.com Platform. Freely available, the new toolkit will help developers create new Internet applications that leverage the capabilities of Adobe RIA technologies, including Adobe Flex(r) 3, Adobe Flash(r) Player, and Adobe AIR software, with their Force.com projects and offerings.

Nuance Communications, a provider of speech solutions, unveiled its Automatic Password Reset module, to reduce the burden of simple tasks on IT help desks and increase employee productivity across the enterprise. Today, password changes within an organization account for the majority of calls into a help desk, costing approximately $10-$20 per call on average, according to analyst firm Gartner.

Baynote, Inc. announced an OEM partnership with Vignette Corporation, a provider of Web Experience Management and Delivery solutions. As part of the agreement, Vignette will leverage Baynote to power Vignette Recommendations, a new solution targeting organizations looking to deliver more personal and engaging Web experiences to their customers.

Amdocs announced that mobilkom austria's newly founded subsidiaries in Serbia and Macedonia, known as Vip mobile and Vip operator, respectively, have deployed Amdocs Billing for convergent voice and data billing. Amdocs Billing enabled Vip mobile and Vip operator to set up billing operations quickly and ensure time-to-market advantages for current and next generation wireless services, including multimedia messaging services (MMS), video streaming and mobile commerce transactions.

Aspect Software, Inc. announced that Affinity Group, Inc., the nation's largest provider of outdoor recreation clubs, media and events, has improved call handling and the member experience it delivers through the use of Aspect Software solutions. The company is using Aspect Unified IP and the PerformanceEdge workforce management capability in its contact center.

SAP is now offering a new fast-start program for its Business-All-in-One solutions. The program targets midsize companies in the manufacturing, services and trade industries and provides them with the pre-configured industry-specific processes needed to streamline and gain visibility into their core business operations. Coupled with SAP MaxDB, the SAP database product, and free choice of operating system, the offering even helps to lower total cost of ownership (TCO) for an on-premise business solution.

Memorial Hospital at Gulfport is providing a safer environment and better patient care with wireless tracking and management of patients and equipment using healthcare mobility solutions from Nortel. These solutions, delivered in cooperation with Nortel channel partner CDW Healthcare, include Nortel's Asset Tracking and Management Solution and Collaborative Clinical Solution.