Conga, one of Salesforce’s biggest AppExchange partners, has merged with Quote-to-Cash leader Apttus, in what is rumoured to be a $715 million deal.
Conga
Conga is a well-known brand around the Salesforce ecosystem, having launched their document generation app nearly 15 years ago when the AppExchange was initially founded. Since then, and with the help of a $70M funding round in 2015, they have exploded in growth from around 70 employees to over 600, with a new suite of products. Conga focuses on “Digital Document Transformation”, of which its main focuses include document generation (Quotes, Contracts, Purchase Orders etc…), Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM), as well as eSignature.
Apttus
Apttus, on the other hand, has an interesting story within the Salesforce ecosystem. They were some of the first pioneers in the Configure, Price, Quote (CPQ) space, as well as providing a robust, enterprise-level CLM tool. While not exclusive to Salesforce, Apttus had a big focus to become the go to Quote-to-Cash provider for companies that use Salesforce. If you attended a Salesforce event from 2012-2015, you will have most likely been greeted by a sea of green shirts and bags, heading back home with as much Apttus swag as you could grab.
But Apttus’ relationship with Salesforce took an unexpected turn, when Salesforce acquired rival Steelbrick (Now Salesforce CPQ) for $360M back in 2015. It was rumoured that Apttus had been the prefered solution (Seeing as Salesforce use Apttus internally), but wanted around $2B, which was a price too high to pay. Since the acquisition, and with Apttus now competing with their favourite partner, Apttus dropped their focus on Salesforce.
The Acquisition
Conga has announced on their website that the Apttus brand will continue to exist under Conga, and the two companies will combine to continue delivering digital transformation. I’m interested to hear how the two companies products will evolve and integrate together, and whether Conga will now have new technology platforms to focus on, other than Salesforce. What are your thoughts?
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