Salesforce history: Beyond the Ticker

Over the past quarter of a century, Salesforce (CRM) has become one of the global leaders in the cloud-based software industry. In 2022 alone, Salesforce's revenue topped $31 billion, a more than 18% year-over-year increase.

But what led to Salesforce's growth in the cloud computing industry? Beyond the Ticker takes a closer look at some of the company's biggest moments.

1999

Salesforce was founded by former Oracle executive Marc Benioff, Parker Harris, Dave Moellenhoff, and Frank Dominguez, specializing in software as a service (SaaS).

2000

The dot com bubble burst, and the company was forced to lay off 20% of its employees.

On February 7, 2000, Salesforce.com officially launched an event themed around “The End of Software” at San Francisco’s Regency Theater featuring The B-52s.

2003

Salesforce continued to grow, with its revenue skyrocketing to over $100 million by December 2003.

2004

In June 2004, the company went public via initial public offering (IPO) on the New York Stock Exchange at $11 per share.

2009

Salesforce had an annual revenue of just over $1 billion.

That same year, Salesforce launched Service Cloud for customer service and support automation.

2014

Salesforce debuted Trailhead, a free online learning platform empowering anyone — regardless of education level — to develop the skills needed to land top tech jobs.

2016

The company launched Einstein, the first comprehensive artificial intelligence (AI) technology for customer relationship management (CRM), making AI accessible to every company and business user.

2020

Salesforce was added to the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI), replacing energy giant ExxonMobil (XOM).

2021

Salesforce completed the acquisition of Slack for $27.7 billion, its largest acquisition to date.

2023

The company introduced the next generation of Einstein AI, Einstein GPT, the world’s first generative AI for CRM.

From its humble beginnings to a market cap of over $276 billion, Salesforce now stands as one of the world's most distinguished software companies.

From tech giants to retail titans, Beyond the Ticker is a historical series that takes a deep dive into some of Wall Street's trending companies and how they transformed into the financial icons they are today.

Check out more of our Beyond the Ticker series, and be sure to tune in to Yahoo Finance.

Editor's note: This video was produced by Zach Faulds.

Video transcript

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Over the past quarter of a century, Salesforce has become one of the global leaders in the Cloud-based software industry. In 2022 alone, the company's revenue topped $31 billion, a more than 18% year-over-year increase. But what led to Salesforce's growth in the Cloud computing industry? Beyond the Ticker takes a closer look at some of the company's biggest moments. Salesforce was founded in 1999 by former Oracle executive Marc Benioff, Parker Harris, David Moellenhoff, and Frank Dominguez specializing in software as a service.

But just a year later, dot-com bubble burst, and the company was forced to lay off 20% of its employees. On February 7, 2000, Salesforce.com officially launched an event themed around the end of software at San Francisco's Regency theater featuring the B-52's. Salesforce continued to grow with its revenue skyrocketing to over $100 million by December 2003. And in June 2004, the company went public via IPO on the New York Stock Exchange at $11 per share.

In 2009, Salesforce's annual revenue topped out at just over $1 billion. And the same year, the company launched Service Cloud for customer service and support automation. Five years later, Salesforce debuted Trailhead, a free online learning platform empowering anyone regardless of education level to develop the skills needed to land top tech jobs. Two years later, the company launched Einstein, the first comprehensive AI technology for customer relationship management making AI accessible to every company and business user.

In 2020, Salesforce was added to the Dow Jones Industrial Average replacing energy giant ExxonMobil. And in 2021, Salesforce completed the acquisition of Slack for $27.7 billion, its largest acquisition to date. Two years later, the company introduced the next generation of Einstein AI, Einstein GPT, the world's first generative AI for CRM. From its humble beginnings to a market cap of over $276 billion, Salesforce now stands as one of the world's most distinguished software companies.

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