Salesforce clients must recognize Infosys’ growing Salesforce capability: the acquisition of Simplus would support its ongoing ambition to become a CRM transformation services provider

In February 2020, Infosys announced its intention to acquire Simplus, a Salesforce services Platinum partner in the USA and Australia. Simplus delivers consulting and implementation services for Salesforce quote-to-cash applications. Industry executives must take note of this and other recent Infosys acquisitions that strengthen its capabilities and local presence.

In the past few years, Infosys has made several Salesforce acquisitions that significantly transform its Salesforce services offerings and local delivery capability.

Exhibit 1: Salesforce acquisitions improve service offerings and local delivery presence

Source: HFS 2020

Services capabilities: Infosys is transforming from a legacy modernization firm to a CRM business partner

Infosys has an established reputation as a legacy modernization Salesforce services provider. It has experience in assisting clients in moving to the cloud, supported by proprietary tools, including cloud templates. As enterprises have considered cloud migrations more seriously in the past five years, this has been a successful approach by Infosys to gain market share in this crowded, competitive landscape.

However, Infosys has made several investments in the past three years to re-position its value proposition to clients as a CRM transformation services provider. The obvious gap it has needed to fill is delivering consulting services capabilities, which it has started to address with acquisitions of digital agencies. These enable Infosys to provide advisory-led engagement and focus on innovation and change rather than standard legacy-to-cloud migrations. Additionally, Simplus (once it closes) and Fluido add Salesforce bench strength, particularly in consulting and implementation services. The Salesforce quote-to-cash offering is particularly hot at the moment, and services skills in this area are scarce in the market. So Simplus would bring much-needed talent for Infosys as it endeavors to stay competitive in this market.

Local presence: Infosys is emphasizing local delivery rather than offshore capabilities in its transformation journey as a services provider

These acquisitions also provide onshore resources that have relevant skills demanded by Salesforce services clients today. A full suite of onshore skills is a massive strength and differentiator in the Salesforce services market. Salesforce services clients do not always consider geographical footprint and scale as an important service provider selection criterion. Clearly, local presence is required for any consulting engagement, but it is often overlooked for the implementation project because SaaS projects are usually remotely deployed and managed, and clients assume that they will not need any resource in the local countries. This is not necessarily so in reality, and post-deployment, we have heard clients say “We wish we had more resources onsite.” Some service providers can fly resources to different locations, but clients do not want to pay for this cost. In addition to making acquisitions, it’s worth noting that Infosys also continues to invest in Innovation “Living Labs” in Europe, the Middle East, Australia, and India.

The Bottom Line: If Infosys can capitalize on its Salesforce services capabilities and onshore presence strategy, it can become a leading player in this market, particularly for target client segments

Infosys has invested a lot of money and effort in its Salesforce services practice in the past few years in an attempt to elevate its position to one of strategic business partner for clients. It’s an easier sell for existing clients who give Infosys the opportunity to demonstrate its new-found skills as well as its ongoing proprietary development of tools and technologies. Convincing prospective clients could be trickier. Infosys also has a lot of competition in this market from providers making similar investments. For example, Cognizant recently also announced its intention to buy two Salesforce companies. Constantly upskilling and the ability to offer a blended delivery model that delivers advisory value, as well as cost-effective application development work, are the standard challenges for all Salesforce services providers. To stand out, Infosys will have to excel at supporting target solution areas and industry sectors.