Dell Teams Up With Salesforce.com To Jumpstart SMBs Into The Cloud

Dell has partnered with Salesforce.com to target small and medium-sized businesses (SMB) looking to cloud computing for better efficiency and flexibility in managing their customer relationships. The new offering combines Dell Integration Services with Salesforce's CRM solution (now branded as the Sales Cloud) and wraps them up with special pricing options and free trials.

Dell will offer systems integration and data migration services and resell Salesforce.com's software starting with the basic Contact Manager ($99/user/year). Customers can also choose from one of Salesforce's full-fledged CRM offerings in the Group ($35/user/month), Professional ($65/user/month) or Enterprise ($125/user/month) editions. The last two editions allow an unlimited number of users, while the first two are capped at two and five users.

Dell Integration Services include the integration of existing applications with the Sales Cloud and data migration. Customers also get the option of using their existing hardware or the Dell Integration appliance, built on Dell PowerEdge servers, which enables connectivity between the Sales Cloud and existing applications. Special pricing is available for both the professional integration services and the integration hardware.

The partnership is part of Michael Dell's new strategy to focus more on SMB's and lead with professional services, a higher margin business than hardware and one that puts it in a better strategic position with customers, not to mention its main competitors IBM and HP. It also comes quickly on the heels of Dell's recent decision to acquire Perot Systems for $3.9 billion.