International Business Machines Corp. (IBM), salesforce.com, inc. (CRM): Is the Cloud the New Way to Go?

salesforce.com, inc. (NYSE:CRM) will benefit from the acquisition of ExactTarget Inc (NYSE:ET) as the latter provides services to the marketing departments of companies, a segment that Salesforce has been directing much of its attention to lately. Companies use ExactTarget software to plan marketing campaigns; as that is what Salesforce was looking for, the companies should complement each other perfectly. Salesforce is paying a high price to expand its market share in the digital marketing sector, however. The negative aspect that Salesforce has to review is the offering of a public cloud service, as customers must rely on the company’s infrastructure and it has less portability than IBM, for example.

SAP AG (ADR) (NYSE:SAP)’s acquisition will help the company to reinforce its e-commerce segment and help the company battle for the CRM market that is currently dominated by salesforce.com, inc. (NYSE:CRM). Its strategy is focused on providing other companies with all the tools that they need to strengthen their relationships with consumers. Hybris has proven to be a expensive target for SAP, but it will help the company to provide a new range of services that it did not have and better position the company for competition from International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE:IBM) and Oracle Corporation (NASDAQ:ORCL). SAP has stated that it will run Hybris as a separate company, posing the challenge of retaining the top talent of the newly acquired party which may be a difficult task for the German firm.

Vanina Egea has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Salesforce.com. The Motley Fool owns shares of International Business Machines.

The article Is the Cloud the New Way to Go? originally appeared on Fool.com.

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