Slack shares shot up as much as 28% Wednesday, despite being halted twice for volatility, following a report that Salesforce has been in talks to acquire the workplace messaging app. Salesforce shares were down more than 4% on the news.
Slack shares shot up as much as 28% Wednesday, despite being halted twice for volatility, following a report that Salesforce has been in talks to acquire the workplace messaging app.
Any deal would likely value Slack at more than its market capitalization of $17 billion earlier Wednesday, according to the Journal.
A Salesforce acquisition of Slack could be a sensible combination.
Like Slack, Salesforce is also a software company that aims to improve business operations.
A deal to buy Slack would likely mark Salesforce’s largest acquisition ever.
Salesforce last year acquired data analytics firm Tableau Software for $15. 7 billion, in a bid to help companies better visualize and make use of their data.
“This deal would be a major shot across the bow at Microsoft with the company’s Teams offering a direct messaging competitor against Slack that has been a clear hurdle to growth and now would be a two horse race between Microsoft and Salesforce,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in a note to investors.
Ives added that a deal between Slack and Salesforce could set the stage for more merger and acquisition activity in the cloud software space in 2021.
