Salesforce "Acquires" Salesforce.org for $ 300 Million in Broader Refocus on the Nonprofit Sector – TechCrunch



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Salesforce Yesterday, the group announced its intention to reposition its way of providing software to non-profit organizations such as educational institutions and charities: the company announced that it would integrate Salesforce.org, a reseller of software and from Salesforce Services to the nonprofit sector, in Salesforce is part of a new and larger vertical education and non-profit sector. The new vertical, in turn, will be led by Rob Acker, the current CEO of Salesforce.org.

As part of this agreement, Salesforce said it would disburse $ 300 million in cash for all actions of Salesforce.org. The latter had previously existed as a Californian public interest company and will now be converted into a Californian trading company.

Salesforce said the $ 300 million, in turn, will be distributed to another independent non-profit corporation called Salesforce.com Foundation, which will use it for philanthropic purposes. Salesforce will make other contributions to the Foundation, but has not specified the amount.

Salesforce also said the combination would increase the company's annual revenue by approximately $ 150 million to $ 200 million, depending on the closing of the transaction.

Salesforce.org was a way for the company to provide nonprofit software, educational institutions and philanthropic organizations with free or high-value licenses for grants of approximately $ 260 million. distributed to more than 40,000 organizations. Salesforce will continue this practice, but now this effort will likely be part of a larger business in which Salesforce will also develop and sell commercial software and services.

"The combination of Salesforce and Salesforce.org in a new vertical nonprofit and education sector reinforces the strength of Salesforce's philanthropic model," notes the company. "Salesforce will extend this model by continuing to provide free, low-cost software to non-profit organizations and educational institutions around the world and by investing in local communities through employee volunteerism, strategic grants and employee matching of up to $ 5,000 per employee per year. "

The new organization will include sales, marketing and the company's Salesforce Customer Success platform, specifically designed for educational and non-profit communities, as well as all future developments of nonprofit cloud vertical applications, Cloud Education. and Philanthropy Cloud of the company.

Education, nonprofit organizations and philanthropy may not be the most lucrative areas that come to mind when thinking about computer science. business, but because of their sheer size and ubiquity, and the fact that these organizations also greatly need better technology to work better. is a great opportunity.

Some of these solutions will never be propelled into the world of big money – and that should not, in my opinion – but as Newsela and its sponsor, TCV, and Microsoft, recently identified, schools are still large IT buyers, and the same goes for other nonprofit and philanthropic organizations.

I do not know how Salesforce will bring together the different facets of the business, but it makes sense for the company to think about it at least in a more consistent way, providing financial support where it's needed and selling elsewhere.

Salesforce has stated that it expects the transaction to close in the second or third quarter of this year, pending the approval of the California Attorney General and "other customary closing conditions". .

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