Every part of our lives have been transformed by the global pandemic, and how we engage and connect with each other has been fundamentally changed. When we thought about how to approach Dreamforce this year, we knew it required us to think differently. 

As our Chief Marketing Officer Stephanie Buscemi put it, “We know Dreamforce is unlike any other technology conference, and we adopted a beginner’s mind in order to truly transform what it means in the context of a year like no other — 2020.”

As a result, today Salesforce Chair and CEO Marc Benioff will deliver a virtual keynote to kick off Dreamforce to You 2020. The keynote will share our vision for the future, celebrate our customers’ success, and unveil new innovations across the Salesforce Customer 360 Platform. 

Surrounding Dreamforce to You, we announced new product innovations and customers innovating on our platform that will drive success in the ‘New Normal’:

Salesforce Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire Slack

Yesterday, Salesforce announced that Salesforce and Slack have entered into a definitive agreement under which Salesforce will acquire Slack. Combining Slack with Salesforce Customer 360 will be transformative for customers and the industry. The combination will create the operating system for the new way to work, uniquely enabling companies to grow and succeed in the all-digital world.

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Read more in the press release.

Salesforce Hyperforce: The world’s #1 CRM available on major public clouds

Salesforce today announced Hyperforce, a reimagination of the company’s platform architecture built to securely and reliably deliver the entire Salesforce Customer 360, including Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Commerce Cloud, Industries and more, on major public clouds.

Hyperforce is a complete re-architecture of Salesforce designed to deliver an even more powerful and scalable Platform to support the growth and success of Salesforce’s global customer base. Hyperforce will empower Salesforce customers to securely access every Salesforce app and platform from anywhere, while leveraging the scale and agility of the public cloud.

Read more in the press release.

Salesforce Einstein Automate: Change the speed of work with end-to-end intelligent workflow automation

Salesforce today introduced Einstein Automate — an end-to-end workflow automation solution that empowers people and businesses to be more productive.

Organizations are shifting to digital-first customer experiences and creating more data from more systems than ever before. Time-consuming, mundane processes are being transformed, from processing insurance quotes to verifying user account information. As a result, organizations are increasingly turning to new workflow automation technology to help employees be more productive and do their best work. Einstein Automate delivers automation capabilities designed for every business function and industry that enable anyone in a company to build intelligent workflows and integrate data across any system with clicks, not code.

With Einstein Automate, organizations can: 

• Automate anything — using the new Flow Orchestrator, a low-code workflow development tool for users to compose workflows that save employees time by automating complex, multi-user processes and approvals.
• Integrate everything — including disparate apps and data with the new MuleSoft Composer for Salesforce, the fastest and easiest no-code solution to connect disparate apps and data to Salesforce and develop a 360 degree view of the customer.
• Transform any industry — using pre-built solutions and resources from Salesforce and partners on AppExchange, the world’s leading enterprise cloud marketplace, as well as no-code tools, pre-built guided experiences and templates on the newly available OmniStudio. 

Read more in the press release, Q&A with product leader John Kucera, and a feature story on why we’re doubling down on automation.

Service Cloud Workforce Engagement: Help contact centers thrive in an all-digital, work-from-anywhere world 

Salesforce today introduced Service Cloud Workforce Engagement, a new dynamic workforce planning product to help contact centers predict demand for customer service and support, staff agents appropriately, and remotely coach agents in real-time to deliver trusted service experiences.

Service Cloud Workforce Engagement helps companies deliver exceptional service by predicting customer service demand and staffing the right agents, with the right skills, at the right time. With Service Cloud Workforce Engagement, services leaders will be able to:

• Optimize workplace efficiency to meet customer needs with Intelligent Dynamic Forecasting, which uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to help service leaders predict how many requests will come into the contact center, across all channels and regions.
• Shift from a cost center to a profit center with Omnichannel Capacity Planning, which enables service leaders to balance staffing needs across any digital channel — from phone, email, web chat, and text to social channels — and assign the right agents at the right time based on the agent’s skills and availability.
• Increase agent engagement, drive higher performance and quality customer interactions with Personalized Agent Engagement, which allows managers to easily provide real-time coaching and on-demand training from anywhere

Read more in the press release, and Q&A with product leader, Melissa Matross.

Bentley Motors: Reimagining the future of luxury mobility experiences with Salesforce

Salesforce today announced that Bentley Motors, a British sustainable luxury automotive company, will deploy Salesforce cloud solutions to give its employees a 360-degree view of customers—connecting Bentley Motors’ sales, service, and marketing organizations to deliver a white-glove, personalized experience to customers across every interaction.

As automakers place a greater focus on direct customer engagement, which has been accelerated by the pandemic, they need a single source of truth that unifies customer and vehicle data. Bentley Motors has incorporated a range of Salesforce solutions to provide its employees with this 360-degree view in order to deliver: 

• White-Glove Service: Bentley Motors’ team of brand advisors will use Sales Cloud and Service Cloud to manage all prospective and existing customer engagement on a single omni-channel platform, and enable customers to use Live Chat as a new channel of choice for real-time support. 
• Personalized Experiences: Using Marketing Cloud, Bentley Motors will be able to deliver personalized experiences across email, SMS, and web and create customized campaigns based on customers’ interests and history, including sharing information about new car releases or welcoming a new customer to the Bentley Motors community. 
• Increased Growth: Leveraging MuleSoft and Tableau, Bentley Motors will be able to unlock and connect data from hundreds of new and legacy systems to provide its retailers with 360-degree view of the customer. Understanding each customer’s preferences and previous engagement with the brand will empower its retailers to deliver highly-personalized service from the moment a customer enters a Bentley Motors showroom.   

Read more in the press release.

For more on the innovations announced today, tune in to the Dreamforce keynote at 9.40am PT here. 

Forward-Looking Statements

This communication relates to a proposed business combination transaction between Salesforce.com, Inc. (“Salesforce”) and Slack Technologies, Inc. (“Slack”). This communication includes forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Forward-looking statements relate to future events and anticipated results of operations, business strategies, the anticipated benefits of the proposed transaction, the anticipated impact of the proposed transaction on the combined company’s business and future financial and operating results, the expected amount and timing of synergies from the proposed transaction, the anticipated closing date for the proposed transaction and other aspects of our operations or operating results. These forward-looking statements generally can be identified by phrases such as “will,” “expects,” “anticipates,” “foresees,” “forecasts,” “estimates” or other words or phrases of similar import. It is uncertain whether any of the events anticipated by the forward-looking statements will transpire or occur, or if any of them do, what impact they will have on the results of operations and financial condition of the combined companies or the price of Salesforce or Slack stock. These forward-looking statements involve certain risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond the parties’ control, that could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated in such forward-looking statements, including but not limited to: the impact of public health crises, such as pandemics (including coronavirus (COVID-19)) and epidemics and any related company or government policies and actions to protect the health and safety of individuals or government policies or actions to maintain the functioning of national or global economies and markets; the effect of the announcement of the merger on the ability of Salesforce or Slack to retain and hire key personnel and maintain relationships with customers, suppliers and others with whom Salesforce or Slack do business, or on Salesforce’s or Slack’s operating results and business generally; risks that the merger disrupts current plans and operations and the potential difficulties in employee retention as a result of the merger; the outcome of any legal proceedings related to the merger; the ability of the parties to consummate the proposed transaction on a timely basis or at all; the satisfaction of the conditions precedent to consummation of the proposed transaction, including the ability to secure regulatory approvals on the terms expected, at all or in a timely manner; the ability of Salesforce to successfully integrate Slack’s operations; the ability of Salesforce to implement its plans, forecasts and other expectations with respect to Salesforce’s business after the completion of the transaction and realize expected synergies; and business disruption following the merger. These risks, as well as other risks related to the proposed transaction, will be included in the registration statement on Form S-4 and proxy statement/prospectus that will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) in connection with the proposed transaction. While the list of factors presented here is, and the list of factors to be presented in the registration statement on Form S-4 are, considered representative, no such list should be considered to be a complete statement of all potential risks and uncertainties. For additional information about other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements, please refer to Salesforce’s and Slack’s respective periodic reports and other filings with the SEC, including the risk factors identified in Salesforce’s and Slack’s most recent Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and Annual Reports on Form 10-K. The forward-looking statements included in this communication are made only as of the date hereof. Neither Salesforce nor Slack undertakes any obligation to update any forward-looking statements to reflect subsequent events or circumstances, except as required by law.

No Offer or Solicitation

This communication is not intended to and shall not constitute an offer to buy or sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy or sell any securities, or a solicitation of any vote or approval, nor shall there be any sale of securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction. No offering of securities shall be made, except by means of a prospectus meeting the requirements of Section 10 of the U.S. Securities Act of 1933, as amended.

Additional Information about the Merger and Where to Find It

In connection with the proposed transaction, Salesforce intends to file with the SEC a registration statement on Form S-4 that will include a proxy statement of Slack and that also constitutes a prospectus of Salesforce. Each of Salesforce and Slack may also file other relevant documents with the SEC regarding the proposed transaction. This document is not a substitute for the proxy statement/prospectus or registration statement or any other document that Salesforce or Slack may file with the SEC. The definitive proxy statement/prospectus (if and when available) will be mailed to stockholders of Salesforce and Slack. INVESTORS AND SECURITY HOLDERS ARE URGED TO READ THE REGISTRATION STATEMENT, PROXY STATEMENT/PROSPECTUS AND ANY OTHER RELEVANT DOCUMENTS THAT MAY BE FILED WITH THE SEC, AS WELL AS ANY AMENDMENTS OR SUPPLEMENTS TO THESE DOCUMENTS, CAREFULLY AND IN THEIR ENTIRETY IF AND WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE BECAUSE THEY CONTAIN OR WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT THE PROPOSED TRANSACTION. Investors and security holders will be able to obtain free copies of the registration statement and proxy statement/prospectus (if and when available) and other documents containing important information about Salesforce, Slack and the proposed transaction, once such documents are filed with the SEC through the website maintained by the SEC at http://www.sec.gov. Copies of the documents filed with the SEC by Salesforce will be available free of charge on Salesforce’s website at www.salesforce.com/investor or by contacting Salesforce’s Investor Relations department at investor@salesforce.com. Copies of the documents filed with the SEC by Slack will be available free of charge on Slack’s website at investor.slackhq.com or by contacting Slack’s Investor Relations department at ir@slack.com.

Participants in the Solicitation

Salesforce, Slack and certain of their respective directors and executive officers may be deemed to be participants in the solicitation of proxies in respect of the proposed transaction. Information about the directors and executive officers of Salesforce, including a description of their direct or indirect interests, by security holdings or otherwise, is set forth in Salesforce’s proxy statement for its 2020 Annual Meeting of Stockholders, which was filed with the SEC on May 1, 2020, and Salesforce’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2020, which was filed with the SEC on March 5, 2020, as well as in a Form 8-K filed by Salesforce with the SEC on June 1, 2020. Information about the directors and executive officers of Slack, including a description of their direct or indirect interests, by security holdings or otherwise, is set forth in Slack’s proxy statement for its 2020 Annual Meeting of Stockholders, which was filed with the SEC on May 5, 2020, and Slack’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2020, which was filed with the SEC on March 12, 2020. Other information regarding the participants in the proxy solicitations and a description of their direct and indirect interests, by security holdings or otherwise, will be contained in the proxy statement/prospectus and other relevant materials to be filed with the SEC regarding the proposed transaction when such materials become available. Investors should read the proxy statement/prospectus carefully when it becomes available before making any voting or investment decisions. You may obtain free copies of these documents from Salesforce or Slack using the sources indicated above.