Salesforce.com is again expanding beyond its customer-relationship management roots, with an acquisition designed to broaden its service and platform.
The company has acquired InStranet, a Chicago-based maker of call-centre software, for approximately $31.5m (£16.9m). The purchase gives Salesforce technology that it will use both for its internal customer-service purposes, and for a new software-as-a-service (SaaS) offering expected to launch within 18 months, the company said.
InStranet makes so-called 'knowledge-base management' software, which can improve companies' self-service support functions by making it easier for customers to find answers to common support questions.
Salesforce said it plans to integrate the software — which is not currently delivered as an online service — into its SaaS platform. InStranet's 44 employees, based in Chicago and Paris, will join Salesforce. Alex Dayon, InStranet's chief executive, will become a vice president of product management at Salesforce, according to Salesforce representative Bruce Francis.
Read this
Salesforce chief takes stock of software shifts
Chief executive Marc Benioff discusses cloud computing, an uneasy economy and why Microsoft is still a dinosaur...
InStranet, founded in 1999, brings some big-name customers to Salesforce, including UK-based telecommunications provider Orange, T-Mobile and Comcast, among others. Salesforce said it expects that its new SaaS offering, to be called 'Salesforce.com Knowledge Base', will give it a technological edge over competitive offerings from Oracle and SAP, the company's main rivals.
