The Fizzback SaaS offering is a real-time operational VoC solution. It sends consumers requests for feedback relating to a specific interaction or transaction via mobile, web or social media. The consumer is engaged at the point of experience, for example in the contact center, branch, point of sale (POS), mobile application, or web. The feedback is analyzed by the system to determine a relevant response, and automatically conduct a dialog with the consumer in natural language rather than in survey format.

Fizzback's unique approach generates game-changing response rates of up to 50%, significantly higher than industry norms at under 10%, as it motivates consumers to provide relevant feedback, at the moment of interaction. Additionally, consumers provide feedback about their experience rather than only about what was asked in a survey. With more than 150 million feedbacks collected annually, Fizzback enables organizations to better understand their customers' perceptions, and be agile across the organization, while improving customer experience at the various enterprise touch points.

The combination of Fizzback and NICE will both improve CEM as well as operationalize VoC both for the contact center and across the enterprise. Correlating customer feedback to specific interactions or transactions helps improve performance enterprise-wide with statistically validated responses, as well as enhance quality management and processes. Key efficiency metrics that can be significantly improved include First Contact Resolution (FCR) and Average Handle Time (AHT) in the contact center and employee performance in direct customer facing roles.

Capturing, analyzing and acting on the Voice of the Customer (VoC) is critical to the success of any Customer Experience initiative. NICE's cross-channel analytics solutions support VoC programs by: (1) analyzing customer interaction content (indirect feedback), whether the customer is interacting with the organization or talking about the organization through the contact center, social media, or other channels, and by extracting insights from these interactions; and (2) by analyzing customer behavior (inferred feedback), such as transaction and web browsing patterns or their journey along different touch points. By adding direct customer feedback with the Fizzback solution, NICE now provides a complete CEM solution that delivers a holistic understanding of the customer by combining on one platform the VoC from each of the three feedback dimensions: direct, indirect and inferred.

Zeevi Bregman, President and CEO of NICE said, " The adoption of and demand for CEM solutions, at all levels of the organization, including Marketing, Finance and Operations, is on the rise. With the addition of Fizzback, NICE is expanding the scope of its capabilities of Impacting Every Customer Interaction by introducing a Customer Experience Management solution with the most complete Voice of the Customer offering. This enables our customers to more effectively capture, understand and leverage VoC as the foundation to a cross-enterprise CEM strategy."

Rob Keve, CEO of Fizzback said, "Our unique solution has been enabling our customers to achieve exceptionally high response rates from their customers, and to receive feedback in real-time. This combination allows them to take immediate action for increasing customer loyalty and driving efficiency across the enterprise. This has resulted in extremely high usage rates for our customers, making Fizzback a strategic part of how our customers make decisions and run the business. Thus, we are proud to have experienced rapid growth and high rates of product adoption. We are looking forward to combining these capabilities with NICE's real-time, cross-channel analytics to provide both NICE and Fizzback customers greater access to even broader capabilities with a more complete VoC solution."

Under the terms of the agreement, NICE will acquire Fizzback for a total cash consideration of approximately $80 million. Subject to certain conditions and satisfaction of terms, the transaction is scheduled to close in the beginning of the fourth quarter of 2011 with 2 to 3 cents dilution of fully diluted Non-GAAP EPS for that quarter. In 2012, the acquisition is expected to add approximately $20 million to NICE's non-GAAP revenues, to be slightly dilutive, and to become accretive to fully diluted Non-GAAP EPS within four quarters post closing.