Cloud computing giant Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) is in talks to acquire software company Slack (NYSE:WORK), and a deal could be announced as early as next week.
Shares of Slack closed almost 38% higher Wednesday after media reports emerged that Salesforce is engaged in talks to buy the company. Salesforce, whose stock closed down 5% on the news, is scheduled to release its fiscal third-quarter earnings next week.
It’s unclear how much the deal would be valued at. Slack, which was founded in Vancouver, B.C. in 2009, saw its market capitalization grow to more than $20 billion following news of the potential acquisition. Salesforce has been on a buying spree, taking advantage of its growth in recent years to buy other technology companies.
Salesforce acquired MuleSoft for $6.5 billion in 2018, the company’s biggest deal ever at the time, to help connect cloud applications. The following year it spent more than twice that amount to buy Tableau, acquiring the data visualization company for $15.3 billion.
Slack would be one of the biggest software deals ever for the industry. It would rank among IBM’s (NYSE:IBM) $34-billion purchase of Red Hat in 2019, Microsoft’s (NASDAQ:MSFT) $27 billion purchase of LinkedIn in 2016 and Facebook’s (NASDAQ:FB) $19-billion purchase of WhatsApp in 2014.
