Salesforce Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire Slack

Salesforce and Slack Technologies have entered into a definitive agreement under which Salesforce will acquire Slack. Under the terms of the agreement, Slack shareholders will receive $26.79 in cash and 0.0776 shares of Salesforce common stock for each Slack share, representing an enterprise value of approximately $27.7 billion based on the closing price of Salesforce’s common stock on November 30, 2020.

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. “Stewart and his team have built one of the most beloved platforms in enterprise software history, with an incredible ecosystem around it,” said Marc Benioff, Chair and CEO, Salesforce. “This is a match made in heaven. Together, Salesforce and Slack will shape the future of enterprise software and transform the way everyone works in the all-digital, work-from-anywhere world. I’m thrilled to welcome Slack to the Salesforce Ohana once the transaction closes.”

“Salesforce started the cloud revolution, and two decades later, we are still tapping into all the possibilities it offers to transform the way we work. The opportunity we see together is massive,” said Stewart Butterfield, Slack CEO and Co-Founder. “As software plays a more and more critical role in the performance of every organization, we share a vision of reduced complexity, increased power and flexibility, and ultimately a greater degree of alignment and organizational agility. Personally, I believe this is the most strategic combination in the history of software, and I can’t wait to get going.”

"Slack will be deeply integrated into every Salesforce Cloud. As the new interface for Salesforce Customer 360, Slack will transform how people communicate, collaborate and take action on customer information across Salesforce as well as information from all of their other business apps and systems to be more productive, make smarter, faster decisions and create connected customer experiences," the companies said in a statement.

Slack’s open platform seamlessly integrates with more than 2,400 apps that people use to collaborate, communicate and get work done. With the largest enterprise app ecosystem, the Salesforce platform is the easiest way to build and deliver apps to connect with customers in a whole new way. Together, Salesforce and Slack will create the most extensive open ecosystem of apps and workflows for business and empower millions of developers to build the next generation of apps, with clicks not code.

Vertiv Ranked as Global Leader in Rapidly Evolving Data Center Cooling Market

Vertiv has been ranked by technology analyst firm Omdia as the largest global supplier in a data center cooling market which continues to undergo change and innovation. The newly released research highlights that established heat rejection technologies such as Direct Expansion (DX), Chilled Water and Evaporative Cooling continue to dominate while also becoming more sustainable. In addition, new technologies, such as forms of liquid cooling, are predicted to grow as data center operators look for ways to further improve efficiency and deal with increasingly power-intensive compute.

The Omdia paper, Data Center Thermal Management Report 2020, published in late 2020 and based on 2018 and 2019 data, states that Vertiv has a 23.5% share of the global data center cooling market – more than 10% higher than its nearest rival. The market for data center thermal technology is set to increase from $3.3bn in 2020 to more than $4.3bn in 2024, according to Omdia. Vertiv also leads the global market for perimeter thermal technologies with a 37.5% market share which is more than 20% higher than the next largest supplier.

In addition to analysing market position, the report provides insight and intelligence on how data center cooling technology is evolving. Established technologies such as chillers and perimeter cooling will remain a large proportion of the market. According to Omdia, split DX is still the primary form of heat rejection in data center thermal management, but chilled water and direct evaporative heat rejection are gaining momentum. In addition, cloud and colocation service provider momentum has accelerated, driving double-digit growth for air handling units (AHU).

Omdia predicts there will also be strong growth in forms of liquid cooling – immersion and direct-tochip – that are expected to double between 2020 and 2024. Several factors are contributing to this shift, including increasing chip and server power consumption, edge growth, increasing rack densities, as well as energy efficiency and sustainability requirements.

Lucas Beran, principal analyst for Omdia’s cloud and data center research practice and the report’s author, said: “The data center thermal management market is on the cusp of an inflection point. Currently, existing airbased thermal products and solutions are driving growth but are limited by their ability to cool 10kW+ rack densities. New technologies, products, and designs are coming to market to help support these high-density deployments and more efficient operations leading to changing market dynamic through 2024.”

“Vertiv’s enduring leadership in thermal management demonstrates that our customers value our domain expertise, our broad-ranging portfolio and the increasing investment in technology, research and development,” said Giordano Albertazzi, president for Vertiv in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA). “The cooling products and solutions we have launched throughout 2020 and our forward-looking innovation roadmap will continue to offer leading technology to our customers, enabling them to achieve higher efficiency and sustainability goals.”