Salesforce has gone and got itself a new best friend – Google. Well at least when it comes to the cloud and expanding into new regions.
The new strategic partnership between Marc Benioff’s company and Google Cloud will see the advertising giant’s cloud unit become the preferred choice for the CRM company when it comes to the public cloud, with GCP becoming core to its international infrastructure expansion.
Not that long ago the CRM company splashed $400m on a public cloud deal with Amazon Web Services to support its international expansion plans, however, the company at the time made clear that this wasn’t an exclusive deal, with it saying: “Salesforce will continue to invest in its own data centers. Salesforce will also utilize AWS in select international markets to help bring new infrastructure online as part of its broader data center strategy.”
Salesforce splashes $400 million on public cloud deal with AWS
It would appear that those “select international markets” will now be going to Google Cloud.
During a press conference at Dreamforce 2017, attended by CBR, staff from Google were reluctant to be drawn on the specifics of the deal and how it would change the dynamics of the Salesforce – AWS relationship.
Asked whether Salesforce would be using Google rather than AWS for new regions Ryan Aytat, Business Development and Strategic Accounts, Salesforce, said that the CRM company would be using “Google for new regions,” but AWS was by no means out of the picture, given that products such as Heroku would still be running on it.
Aytay said that Google had basically entered into the ‘circle of trust’ by becoming a trusted infrastructure provider. The CRM company it would seem has multiple best friends, and multiple tech partners.
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Aside from the curious partnership dynamics developing around Salesforce and its infrastructure partners, the agreement will see a raft of new capabilities available for customers.
New integrations will connect the CRM platform with G Suite, meaning that Salesforce Lightning and Quip and Gmail, Hangouts Meet, Google Calendar, Drive, Docs and Sheets will all work together.
Plus, there will also be deep integration between the CRM company and the Google Analytics 360 suite. Salesforce Marketing Cloud and GA 360 and the Sales Cloud and the same product will be integrated, giving a wide variety of capabilities and new insights for marketers to take advantage of.
What else is being announced at Dreamforce 2017?
“Our partnership with Google represents the best of both worlds for our customers,” said Marc Benioff, Chairman and CEO, Salesforce. “There has never been an easier way for companies to run their entire business in the cloud—from productivity apps, email and analytics, to sales, service and marketing apps, this partnership will help make our customers smarter and more productive.”
For Google this represents a big win, a route into the enterprise that equals anything that AWS or Microsoft can offer.
“This partnership is natural; Salesforce CRM and G Suite together will let teams work more productively. Our up-to-a-year at no cost offer makes it possible for eligible Salesforce customers to experience G Suite’s transformative impact. We are also thrilled to have Salesforce announce that their core services will run on our Cloud, and that Salesforce’s Sales and Marketing Clouds will be powering better insights with Google Analytics 360, which is also built on Google Cloud,” said Diane Greene, CEO, Google Cloud. “This will all be a big win for our customers and partners.”
