Goldman Reiterates 'Conviction Buy' On Salesforce Heading Into Dreamforce

Goldman Sachs’ Heather Bellini believes the 11 percent decline in salesforce.com, inc. CRM since FQ2 earnings were released on August 31 presents an attractive buying opportunity.

Bellini maintained a Buy rating on the company, with a price target of $96.

Leading into Salesforce’s annual user conference, Dreamforce, Goldman Sachs held investor meetings with the company’s implementations partners and platform partners.

“All in, our checks with implementation partners pointed to a strong core Salesforce business which we view as a positive read on the stock versus investor sentiment,” Bellini mentioned.

Related Link: Salesforce's 'Dreamforce' Event Is Like Woodstock For Fans Of The Cloud

What Implementation Partners Said

One of the implementation partners, Appirio, believes that its Salesforce practice has increased 27 percent year-to-date, with 20 percent growth in Sales Cloud and growth in the 60 percent range for Marketing and platform.

“Partners cited a continued opportunity in Siebel replacements, strong upsell to a multi-cloud approach, and the success of core acquisition like Steelbrick,” Bellini stated.

What Platform Partners Said

Platform partners attributed their business growth to the scalability and speed of Salesforce.com’s technology, as well as the company’s distribution platform.

“The positive checks from our partner meetings give us confidence in CRM’s core business and its ability to accelerate billings growth in F2H17 after soft results last quarter,” the analyst added.

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