Salesforce.com Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire Rypple - First Step Toward Human Capital Management for the Social Enterprise

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 15, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Salesforce.com [NYSE: CRM], the enterprise cloud computing company (http://www.salesforce.com/cloudcomputing/), today announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Rypple, a cloud-based social performance management company. The acquisition signifies salesforce.com's entry into the human capital management (HCM) market for the social enterprise. Salesforce.com plans to re-launch Rypple as "Successforce" and create a new HCM business unit, which will be run by John Wookey. Rypple's unique social technologies will also extend the value of salesforce.com's existing core products. The transaction is expected to close in salesforce.com's fiscal first quarter ending April 30, 2012, subject to customary closing conditions.

(Logo:  http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20050216/SFW105LOGO)

Comments on the News

• "Salesforce.com and Rypple share a vision for extending the social enterprise to transform the way we work," said Marc Benioff, chairman and CEO, salesforce.com. "The next generation of HCM is not just about a cloud delivery model, it's about a fundamentally better way to recruit, manage and empower employees in a social world."
• "Our social enterprise strategy continues to accelerate, and is at the root of the broad-based transformation and innovation we are seeing from customers today," said John Wookey, executive vice president, advanced applications, salesforce.com. "With the launch of Successforce, salesforce.com plans to revolutionize HCM starting with an exciting social performance management app that will delight millions of employees around the world."
• "We chose Rypple to be the core of Facebook's employee performance management platform because it's designed from the ground up to be social," said Tim Campos, CIO, Facebook. "We are delighted to see it become part of salesforce.com's social enterprise strategy."
• "Rypple was designed from the start to be fun, social, and mobile--an app that can delight managers and employees in entirely new ways," said Daniel Debow, co-CEO and co-founder, Rypple. "As the leading social enterprise company with more than 100,000 customers worldwide, salesforce.com will allow us to not only strengthen our offering for the hundreds of high-performing organizations that use Rypple today, but also scale it to reach many more."
• "We took the science of team performance and applied the collaborative, transparent, and real-time power of social networks to create a completely new model for managing people and the work they deliver," said David Stein, co-CEO and co-founder, Rypple. "Salesforce.com gives us the opportunity to apply our expertise and extend our vision for Rypple with Successforce."

Salesforce.com Redefines HCM for the Social Enterprise
Traditional HCM software that many businesses use today was designed 30 years ago for personnel departments whose goal was to minimize the cost and risk of employing people. While HCM software hasn't changed in decades, the way people work has radically changed.

Today's workforce demands new performance and leadership tools that are completely transparent and allow employees to be connected to their company's mission and each other. Social enterprises and progressive HR leaders are embracing apps like Rypple, which focus on the inherent social nature of performance management—goal setting, feedback, recognition and continuous dialogue—to help employees align more effectively around the company mission.

The acquisition of Rypple and its planned re-launch as Successforce signify salesforce.com's entry into the HCM market. The company plans to expand into other areas with a new social model that will revolutionize the way companies recruit talent, build teams, empower employees and achieve results.

The new HCM business unit, including Successforce, will be led by John Wookey, salesforce.com's executive vice president of advanced applications. Wookey comes to salesforce.com with more than 20 years of experience in enterprise software, including senior leadership positions at Oracle and SAP.

Extending the Value of Salesforce.com's Existing Products
A social revolution is taking place today. The number of social networking users has surpassed e-mail users. Nearly a quarter of all time spent online is spent on social networks like Facebook. People access the Internet more from mobile devices than from desktops. Today, companies must change the way they collaborate, communicate and share information with customers and employees to stay competitive. Salesforce.com is helping companies meet the challenge of this social revolution with its social enterprise strategy.

With this acquisition, salesforce.com will embed some of Rypple's next-generation features into its existing products. For example, people will be able to thank colleagues, win badges and provide recognition – all from within Salesforce Chatter. And customers of core Salesforce products - the Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, and Force.com platform – will be able to connect with new employee feedback tools to help drive business goals and power the future of their employee social networks.

Rypple: Pioneers of Social Apps
Founded in 2008, Rypple pioneered a new approach to performance management--one that empowers managers and their teams to learn faster and perform better. Rypple is a social performance app built for the way we work today—in real time. With Rypple, teams can share key priorities and get the continuous feedback, coaching, and recognition they need to consistently achieve their goals, making performance management painless and effective. Hundreds of companies including Facebook, Gilt Groupe, and Spotify use Rypple's social performance app, which is based on 50+ years of behavioral science, focusing on what really keeps people passionate about their work.

Details Regarding the Proposed Acquisition
The transaction is expected to close in salesforce.com's fiscal first quarter ending April 30, 2012, subject to customary closing conditions. The transaction is not expected to have a material impact on revenue for FY13. Salesforce.com will initiate EPS guidance for fiscal 2013 on its fourth quarter conference call in February.

About Rypple
Rypple is web-based social performance management software that helps managers and employees improve performance through social goals, continuous feedback and meaningful recognition. Designed to build a transparent, results-driven work culture, Rypple replaces the traditional performance review with an easy, social and collaborative approach so people know where they stand and are accountable for achieving their goals. Hundreds of high-performing organizations use Rypple, including Facebook, Gilt Groupe, Kobo, Mozilla and Rackspace. Founded in 2008, Rypple is funded by Bridgescale Partners, Edgestone Capital Partners, Peter Thiel and a veteran team of angel investors. Learn more at www.rypple.com.

About Salesforce.com
With 100,000+ customers, salesforce.com is the enterprise cloud computing company that is leading the shift to the social enterprise. Social enterprises leverage social, mobile and open cloud technologies to put customers at the heart of their business. Based on salesforce.com's real-time, multitenant architecture, the company's platform and application services include:

• Salesforce Chatter, a secure, private social network for your business
• Salesforce Sales Cloud, for sales force automation and contact management
• Salesforce Service Cloud, for customer service and support solutions
• Salesforce Radian6, for social media monitoring and engagement
• Salesforce Data.com, for the most complete source of accurate business data
• AppExchange, the leading marketplace for enterprise cloud computing applications
• Force.com, for custom application development
• Heroku, for building social and mobile customer apps
• Database.com, the world's first enterprise cloud database

Any unreleased services or features referenced in this or other press releases or public statements are not currently available and may not be delivered on time or at all.  Customers who purchase salesforce.com applications should make their purchase decisions based upon features that are currently available. Salesforce.com has headquarters in San Francisco, with offices in Europe and Asia, and trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "CRM." For more information please visit http://www.salesforce.com, or call 1-800-NO-SOFTWARE.

Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains certain forward-looking statements about salesforce.com and Rypple, including statements that involve risks and uncertainties concerning salesforce.com's proposed acquisition of Rypple, the potential financial impact of the acquisition, the expected closing of the acquisition, anticipated product information, capabilities, scale and strategy, including entering the HCM market and embedding Rypple's next-generation features into salesforce.com's existing products, benefits of the proposed acquisition, the acceleration of the social enterprise strategy and the anticipated revolution of HCM technology, personnel matters, market and industry trends, and general business outlook. When used in this press release, the words "can," "will," "intends," "expects," "is expected," similar expressions and any other statements that are not historical facts are intended to identify those assertions as forward-looking statements. Any such statement may be influenced by a variety of factors, many of which are beyond the control of salesforce.com or Rypple, that could cause actual outcomes and results to be materially different from those projected, described, expressed or implied in this press release due to a number of risks and uncertainties. Potential risks and uncertainties include, among others, the possibility that the transaction will not close or that the closing may be delayed, the anticipated synergies and benefits of the combined companies may not be achieved, the combined companies may experience delays, unexpected costs or be unable to complete integration activities in a timely manner, if at all, the possibility that key personnel of Rypple may not be retained by salesforce.com, responses from competitors, customers, users and partners, general economic conditions in the markets in which either company does business, and the possibility that salesforce.com or Rypple may be adversely affected by other economic, business, and/or competitive factors. Accordingly, no assurances can be given that any of the events anticipated by the forward-looking statements will transpire or occur, or if any of them do so, what impact they will have on the results of operations or financial condition of salesforce.com or Rypple.

In addition, please refer to the documents that salesforce.com files with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Forms 10-K, 10-Q and 8-K. These filings identify and address other important factors that could cause salesforce.com's financial and operational results to differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements set forth in this press release. You are cautioned to not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this press release. Neither salesforce.com nor Rypple is under any duty to update any of the information in this press release.

Salesforce.com will host a conference call with investors at 5:00 PM (ET) / 2:00 PM PT, Dec. 15, 2011, to discuss the transaction. A live dial-in is available domestically at +1-866- 901-7332/ passcode# 36411587. International callers may dial +1-706-902-1764/ passcode# 36411587. A live web webcast of the event will be available on the salesforce.com Investor Relations website at http://www.salesforce.com/company/investor/. A replay will be available at +1-800-642-1687 or +1-706-645-9291/ passcode# 36411587 until midnight (ET) January 13, 2012.

Copyright (c) 2011 salesforce.com, inc. All rights reserved. Salesforce.com, Salesforce, Chatter, Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Radian6, Data.com, AppExchange, Force.com, Heroku, and all associated logos are trademarks of salesforce.com, inc. in the United States and other countries. Other names used herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.

SOURCE salesforce.com