Salesforce to acquire data analysis specialist Tableau for $15.7 billion

Salesforce

Data analysis providers are currently very much in demand as takeover candidates. Last week, Looker was taken over by Google/Alphabet at a price of USD 2.6 billion. Yesterday it was announced that Salesforce wants to acquire Tableau. The boards of directors of both companies have already agreed. Now the takeover is conditional on whether a majority of the current Tableau shareholders want to exchange their shares. In addition, the regulatory authorities still have to give their approval. However, this can be assumed at present.

“We are bringing together the world’s #1 CRM with the #1 analytics platform. Tableau helps people see and understand data, and Salesforce helps people engage and understand customers. It’s truly the best of both worlds for our customers–bringing together two critical platforms that every customer needs to understand their world,” said Marc Benioff, chairman and co-CEO, Salesforce. “I’m thrilled to welcome Adam and his team to Salesforce.”

In an interview Marc Benioff is asked about this spectacular deal. His answer: “My job as CEO is to listen deeply to my employees and my customers and to respond to them effectively”. And further: “I’m doing that because it’s customer-driven”. There is no better way to argue such a deal!

Tableau’s product range now includes data analysis tools as well as data cleansing and machine learning tools. According to Tableau, it has 86,000 customers, including Verizon and Netflix.

Here is an assessment of the acquisition of Yahoo!

The battle for CRM market leadership is entering the next round. After last year’s acquisition of Mulesoft, Salesforce now seems well positioned in the data management and analytics market. However, the price for Tableau was no bargain – there is talk of a 40% premium. Or the equivalent of around 182,000 US dollars per customer. So an ambitious calculation – but the main thing is that no one else buys Tableau ?.