In February, Salesforce co-CEO Keith Block announced his departure from the company leaving founder, Marc Benioff as the sole chief executive of the CRM giant. While Salesforce has said that Block will stay on as an advisor for a year, analysts are already predicting the executive's next move.
Analysts at RBC Capital Markets have outlined that the most likely companies Block could join are on‑demand financial management and human capital management software vendor, Workday, multinational computer technology corporation, Oracle or Amazon Web Services.
Though, a return to Oracle seems exceedingly unlikely. Block spent the early years of his career there, racking up over 25 years at the company before leaving in 2013 to pursue his position as president and vice chairman at Salesforce.
According to the analyst note, Amazon Web Services could benefit from Block's leadership style as it competes against Microsoft Azure.
"Not only does Workday, today, have a completely complimentary product set relative to Salesforce's (thus potentially preserving his relationships by not competing directly with his former employer), Workday offers, in many ways, a similar situation to what Keith Block inherited when joining Salesforce seven years ago," RBC's global equity team wrote in a note.
Before the unexpected announcement, some saw Block's rise from the president to co-CEO as a sign that he was in the running to become Salesforce's next sole CEO. "It's been my greatest honor to lead the team with Marc that has more than quadrupled Salesforce from $4 billion of revenue when I joined in 2013 to over $17 billion last year," said Block in a statement released by the company.
Benioff also shared his thoughts on Block's departure, sharing that he's "especially grateful to Keith for his service to Salesforce over the last seven years. I am delighted that he will be staying on as an advisor to me," said Benioff. "Keith's strategic thinking and operational excellence have deeply strengthened our company, and our close friendship endures."
This coincided with Salesforce announcing that it had named Gavin Patterson, former BT Group plc chief executive, its president and CEO of Salesforce International.
