Posted on by Joey Lombardi

Supplier Report: 10/8/2016

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Nobody wants to buy Twitter, but that isn’t stopping SalesForce, Google, and Microsoft with moving forward with their long term plans.

Internet of Things is trending this week as Microsoft is quietly shutting down their fitness band division, but will they buy FitBit (and what would they do with all of that data)? IBM is dropping $200M on a new IoT HQ in Germany.

There were also a few interesting team-ups this week: VMWare and Amazon on some potential VMWare options on AWS and IBM and AT&T deepening their relationship via cloud services.

Acquisitions

  • Plat.One acquisition marks start of $2B IoT investment plan for SAP

    SAP has bought IoT software developer Plat.One, marking the start of a plan to invest US$2 billion in the internet of things over the next five years.

    Some of those billions will be spent on the creation of IoT development labs around the world, SAP said Wednesday. It already has plans for such labs in Berlin, Johannesburg, Munich, Palo Alto, Shanghai and São Leopoldo in Brazil.

    The company is also rolling out a series of “jump-start” and “accelerator” IoT software packages for particular industries, to help them monitor and control equipment.

    http://www.pcworld.com/article/3124442/internet-of-things/platone-acquisition-marks-start-of-2b-iot-investment-plan-for-sap.html#tk.rss_all

  • Salesforce snaps up Krux for $700M on eve of Dreamforce

    On the eve of Dreamforce, his company’s annual developers shindig, Salesforce agreed on Monday to acquire Krux, a marketing-data start-up, for $700 million in stock and cash. Krux, which already has a partnership with Salesforce, is expected to bolster Salesforce’s ability to better identify and serve its cloud-software customers.

    http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2016/10/03/salesforce-snaps-up-krux-700m-eve-dreamforce/91490708/

  • Salesforce Investors Could Derail a Potential Deal for Twitter

    During a CNBC interview on Wednesday with Jim Cramer, Benioff neither confirmed nor denied Salesforce’s interest in Twitter, but didn’t exactly sound as if a deal is certain. “We have to look at everything, we’re going to pass on most things,” he said. Salesforce, which was down over 7% at one point, pared its losses a little following Benioff’s remarks.

    The fact that Twitter is already often used as a marketing and customer service vehicle by many companies — including, presumably, many Salesforce clients — probably isn’t lost on Benioff. Salesforce likely sees value in integrating Twitter with its Marketing Cloud (online marketing automation) and Service Cloud (customer service and enterprise collaboration) software. It also could leverage data on Twitter activity to give clients a better understanding of their customers, as well as engage with them more effectively.

    https://www.thestreet.com/story/13843028/1/salesforce-investors-could-derail-a-potential-deal-for-twitter.html
    Salesforce Should Leave This Bird in the Bush

    A Wall Street Journal report late Tuesday makes clear that Salesforce is still very interested. CEO Marc Benioff has reportedly been talking up Twitter behind closed doors—going so far as to describe the troubled microblogging service an “unpolished gem” at one gathering. Salesforce shares fell another 5% as a result. In all, the prospect of buying Twitter has erased nearly $5 billion in Salesforce’s market value.

    http://www.wsj.com/articles/salesforce-should-leave-this-bird-in-the-bush-1475696224

  • Should Microsoft Buy Fitbit?

    Fitbit isn’t for sale, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be bought. There wasn’t a “For Sale” sign hanging on Skype, Yammer, and more recently LinkedIn when Microsoft cracked open its huge pocketbook to snap up niche leaders. This makes Fitbit a logical target for a company with a history of multi-billion dollar purchases and a market leader that is attainable. Fitbit’s present enterprise value of $2.5 billion would be a light bite for Microsoft, even with a reasonable premium on top of that.

    http://www.fool.com/investing/2016/10/06/should-microsoft-buy-fitbit.aspx

  • Oracle Threatens to End NetSuite Deal

    On Friday, Oracle announced that it extended the expiration data of its tender offer for NetSuite to Nov. 4, having already extended the date to Oct. 6 last month “to facilitate the completion of outstanding antitrust reviews.” In September, Oracle received the final antitrust clearance needed, from the U.S. Department of Justice.

    http://www.wsj.com/articles/oracle-to-call-off-netsuite-deal-unless-shareholder-support-increases-1475849434

Artificial Intelligence

Cloud

Datacenter

  • The Job Cuts Begin: Dell Confirms Layoffs

    “Most cuts are overlap, none strategic and/or not part of the new Dell EMC program. To me very normal and a must once the two firms begin to integrate, gel, morph and then execute as a new technology powerhouse with a focused team that [has] the ‘right’ skill sets to address this new world,” Shepard wrote.

    http://www.crn.com/news/channel-programs/300082351/the-job-cuts-begin-dell-confirms-layoffs.htm

  • Why Red Hat, Inc. Gained 11% in September

    The open-source software specialist saw second-quarter earnings rise 17% year over year, based on 17% stronger sales. Both of these figures were above Wall Street’s consensus estimates. Application development tools led the way with 33% higher sales, and Red Hat customers’ adoption of long-term support subscriptions is pacing ahead of the basic revenue growth.

    http://www.fool.com/investing/2016/10/07/why-red-hat-inc-gained-11-in-september.aspx

Software/SaaS

  • Oracle Will Keep Posting Growth in the SaaS Space

    As we discussed earlier in this series, Microsoft (MSFT) emerged as the leader of overall enterprise SaaS (software-as-a-service) space, and Salesforce (CRM) continues to rule the CRM (customer relationship management) space. It was the Oracle’s dominance in ERP (enterprise resource planning), the segment that grew the most in the SaaS space, that led it to register the highest growth in the SaaS space in 2Q16.

    http://marketrealist.com/2016/10/oracle-will-continue-post-growth-saas-space/

Other

  • IBM Brand Value Collapses 19%

    The failure of IBM’s turnaround continues to smother the business. IBM’s shares are off 17% in the past two years, against a 9% improvement in the S&P 500. IBM’s revenue in 2011 was $106.9 billion. In 2015, the figure fell to $81.7 billion.

    http://247wallst.com/technology-3/2016/10/05/ibm-brand-value-collapses-19/

  • SAS CEO Dr Jim Goodnight on the power of big data, literacy and philanthropy

    “We spend 25 per cent of our revenues on R and D every year, which is more than any other major software company,” says Goodnight, who was a statistics professor at the North Caroline State University when he started working on software for agriculture.

    http://www.cio.co.nz/article/607926/sas-ceo-dr-jim-goodnight-on-the-power-of-big-data-literacy-and-philanthropy/

  • Coupa up 87% in software IPO

    But they’re still not profitable. For the six months ending in July, Coupa lost $24.3 million, which compares to a loss of $25.1 million in the same period last year. Yet revenue is growing, up to $53.2 million from $31.6 million in the same time frames.

    CEO Rob Bernshteyn tells us they are more focused on their margins than profitability right now. “For every dollar we burned, we created well over a dollar in recurring revenue,” he told TechCrunch. He says he’s looking to “build this business for the long-term.”

    https://techcrunch.com/2016/10/06/coupa-up-87-in-software-ipo/?ncid=rss