This July, Slack filed a complaint against Microsoft with the European Commission, alleging Microsoft illegally tied Teams product to its “market-dominant Office productivity suite, force installing it for millions, blocking its removal, and hiding the true cost to enterprise customers.” After Microsoft bought LinkedIn for $26.2 billion in 2016, Salesforce - which had bid for the networking site - unsuccessfully lobbied regulators to block that deal, saying it would give Microsoft an unfair advantage. Slack went public in June 2019 with a direct listing, but its shares have traded below the initial offering price as the company didn’t catch fire with investors in the way collaboration companies like Zoom Communications have during the COVID pandemic.īoth Salesforce and Slack have alleged anti-competitive behavior by Microsoft. Personally, I believe this is the most strategic combination in the history of software, and I can’t wait to get going.”īutterfield founded Slack in 2009, and the company reportedly has rebuffed previous acquisition overtures from Google, Microsoft and Amazon. As software plays a more and more critical role in the performance of every organization, we share a vision of reduced complexity, increased power and flexibility, and ultimately a greater degree of alignment and organizational agility.

I’m thrilled to welcome Slack to the Salesforce Ohana once the transaction closes.”īutterfield added, “The opportunity we see together is massive. “Together, Salesforce and Slack will shape the future of enterprise software and transform the way everyone works in the all-digital, work-from-anywhere world. “Stewart and his team have built one of the most beloved platforms in enterprise software history, with an incredible ecosystem around it,” Benioff said in a statement. Salesforce chair and CEO Marc Benioff called the proposed takeover of Slack a “match made in heaven.” Salesforce customers in the media and entertainment space include NBCUniversal, Spotify, Pandora, Activision Blizzard, EA and Vox Media.

Salesforce buys slack price