How Will Salesforce Revenue Cloud Compete Against ServiceNow’s Logik.AI? 

Last month, Salesforce confirmed that their primary CPQ offering, Salesforce CPQ, would be entering its ‘End of Sale’ (EOS) phase. A month later, news broke that ServiceNow had acquired Logik.AI – an AI-powered CPQ solution that is also a long-standing Salesforce Partner.

With Salesforce’s core CPQ offering gone and ServiceNow at the helm of an AI-fuelled CPQ breakthrough, Salesforce is relying on the strengths of their proprietary Revenue Cloud. But is it a fully-fledged solution, and can it compete in the future? 

What Is Revenue Cloud?

Salesforce Revenue Cloud is a Salesforce cloud dedicated to helping businesses manage their entire revenue lifecycle – from quoting to invoicing and billing – all in a unified, fully integrated platform. Its wide range of tools and features makes it easier for sales teams to create streamlined buying and selling experiences, and it supports complex billing scenarios, driving efficiency and enhancing the overall customer and user experience. 

Supporting these functionalities are two different products: Revenue Cloud Advanced and Revenue Cloud Billing. 

Revenue Cloud Advanced (RCA), previously known as Revenue Lifecycle Management (RLM), is an all-in-one solution that combines CPQ, subscription and order management, CLM, document generation, and more, all on the Salesforce platform. 

It is a comprehensive solution that seeks to fill the gaps in the Salesforce CPQ offering in a modern and connected way, empowering teams to easily configure products, apply pricing rules, and generate accurate, professional quotes. Available tools include pricing and discount management, quote generation, guided selling features, and more.

How Will Revenue Cloud Develop?

RCA is Salesforce’s most advanced solution in place of the Salesforce CPQ managed package, but how does it actually fare in real-life scenarios?

John Garvens, a Revenue Cloud Architect, says that Revenue Cloud’s development has already “outpaced expectations”.

“Salesforce Revenue Cloud promises to surpass Salesforce CPQ over time,” he told Salesforce Ben. “I have not seen Salesforce invest this much in its quote-to-cash products since it acquired SteelBrick CPQ for $360 million in December 2015.”

He mentioned that every new release for the product since it became generally available in February 2024 has included significant additions, enhancements, overhauls, and rebrands. We will likely continue to see Revenue Cloud evolve and grow as the product moves further down the quote-to-cash process with order management, billing, and other functions. 

When asked if Salesforce would experience any challenges in this space or not, John remarked that quote-to-cash software is in a “veritable space race.”

“In the years ahead, Salesforce will face intense pressure from its competitors, as well as its customers and partners,” he said. “Competitors will continue to flood the market with appealing options and alternatives. Customers will demand solutions to handle their increasingly complex quote-to-cash processes without breaking the bank. Partners must place bets on which platforms and products they think will win and build their businesses accordingly.”

From there, competitors, customers, and partners alike need to start asking themselves key questions; which platforms are likely to succeed? Which should customers buy and implement? Which should partners support?

John emphasized that it would not just be Salesforce experiencing these challenges. Like with any software that’s adjusting within the AI era, a set of important factors need to be prioritized. This includes how automated they are with the support of AI, how accessible they are, and how functional the UI is. 

How Will It Fare Against Competitors? 

Although ServiceNow’s move to acquire Logik.AI encourages competition against CRM offerings like Salesforce, the battle for quote-to-cash dominance has existed for decades. Software giants like Oracle, Salesforce, SAP, and others have bought their way into the quote-to-cash space by acquiring solutions like BigMachines, SteelBrick, and CallidusCloud.

However, John mentioned that Salesforce are seemingly investing untold sums into developing a new, on-platform, fully integrated quote-to-cash solution that seeks to “dominate the market.”

“That is refreshing because, despite marketing hype and fluff, BigMachines, SteelBrick, CallidusCloud, Apttus, Conga, and Cacheflow are ‘bolt-on’ solutions to the companies that acquired them,” he said. “The underlying technologies are often worlds apart from the core product under the water.”

“ServiceNow’s announcement of plans to acquire Logik.io is a rerun of ‘Company A Acquires Company B.’ What makes this deal particularly noisy and dramatic is Logik’s longtime and intimate partnership with Salesforce, which has soured in recent years. The likely bitter divorce will leave Salesforce customers in the lurch.”

Salesforce is known as a somewhat ‘sticky’ software solution that makes it difficult for organizations to move away from, but as more competitive solutions emerge, we could see a rise in companies ‘biting the bullet’ and exploring something new. 

However, we should all continue to keep an eye on what Salesforce has to offer, especially as they move further away from CPQ.

“Salesforce CPQ customers use Logik to handle advanced configuration; Revenue Cloud will soon release an ‘Advanced Configurator’,” John said. 

It is not likely to stop there either, especially as organizations like ServiceNow find their footing with new acquisitions and products.

Final Thoughts

Following the major Salesforce CPQ news and ServiceNow’s acquisition of Logik.AI, the future of the quote-to-cash space remains uncertain. However, there are a strong set of players all eager to have the winning sales software. 

For ServiceNow, their success lies in how quickly they can roll out Logik.AI’s functionality to their customers. 

For Salesforce, their uptick lies in how successfully they can get Revenue Cloud up and running as a fully-fledged, AI-powered CPQ solution to fill the gap left by Salesforce CPQ.