At an eye-watering cost of $4.75 billion, last week Adobe announced it will be acquiring the leading marketing automation firm Marketo. This year, the company has been making advancements and tightening their grip on the digital marketing space. Indeed, in May, they acquired e-commerce product Magneto for $1.68 billion.
What do these acquisitions mean for Adobe? Well, the price tag of Marketo itself shows how serious they are about harnessing these products to boost their offering. Adobe’s rivalry with Salesforce is very well documented over the last few years, but reached a peak when Salesforce beat them out in its purchase of DemandWare. However, the Marketo acquisition takes this competition to a next level. By purchasing Marketo, Adobe is making a clear play at Salesforce’s domain. The other relationship with impact here is Adobe’s strategic and long-term partnership with Microsoft
Clearly, they are putting all of their fire behind building formidable capabilities and capitalising on the current boom in digital. If they can achieve a monopoly over the entire digital industry, they could be reaping the rewards pretty quickly.
https://www.cmswire.com/digital-marketing/adobe-acquires-marketo-good-things-are-seldom-cheap/
