Salesforce.com, an ASP that specializes in Web-native customer relationship management (CRM) applications, today announced that Jim Steele has joined the company as president of Worldwide Operations.
In the new position, Steele will be responsbile for running worldwide sales, services, support and marketing. He reports directly to Marc Benioff, salesforce.com chairman and CEO.
Most recently, Steele was executive vice president of sales for Ariba. He also worked at IBM for 23 years. Steele’s IBM management roles included vice president of sales and marketing for the western U.S., general manager of the telecommunications and media industry for Asia-Pacific, and vice president of system sales for Asia-Pacific.
“Salesforce.com has grown revenue by orders of magnitude each year since its inception,” said Marc Benioff, salesforce.com chairman and CEO. “With the addition of an executive of Jim Steele’s caliber, we expect not only to continue that performance, but to catalyze the industry shift to our winning software-as-a-service strategy and grow our enterprise customer base.”
San Francisco-based Salesforce.com reports that its revenues are expected to jump from $23 million in 2001 to more than $50 million in 2002. The company has also broaden its product line during the past year with the release of three new versions — Enterprise, Offline and Team Editions.
“Our customers get the customization, integration and automation expected of mature CRM applications, but without the risk or expense of legacy software,” Steele said. “Combined with our technology advantage and market momentum, that value proposition adds up to a rare sweet spot we uniquely serve. That was the appeal for me.”
Salesforce.com is listed by ASPnews as a Top 20 Service Provider.
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