Direct Sales
A marriage of convenience has taken place between computer maker, Dell, and software service firm, Salesforce.com, as the pair combine to take on the lucrative services industry for small and medium businesses (SMBs) in the US.
The deal, announced Friday, will mean Salesforce.com can take advantage of Dell's significant corporate customer base in the US, whilst Dell will be able to dip its toe into the services pond where bigger rivals IBM and HP already swim freely.
The move should be a profitable one for Dell whose revenues were hurt when the PC market - which makes up 60 per cent of the firm's business - took a tumble during the ongoing economic crisis.
On the other hand, the sales management software industry is worth an estimated $9 billion a year and is still growing fast, based on analyst predictions. Dell is keen to grab a piece of the services pie, which is one of the reasons the PC maker recently shelled out $3.9 billion for technology services company Perot Systems; the firm's largest ever acquisition.
Now Dell says it will sell Salesforce's core CRM software and provide services integrating them with customers' existing software. Four versions of the software will initially be made available; Salesforce Contact Manager, Group Edition, Professional Edition and Enterprise Edition.
Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
