Here's an eye opener. Microsoft(s msft) and Salesforce.com(s crm) are discussing a deal that could put Salesforce.com's market-leading CRM Software as a Service on Microsoft's Azure cloud, according to Bloomberg's Dina Bass.
And that, my friends, is a huge thing. Even if no deal is completed the fact that they're talking about it, and Bass is usually on the money, is big. Microsoft has spent a lot of time and money building its own Dynamics CRM, with Salesforce.com in the crosshairs.
And Salesforce.com's exuberant CEO Marc Benioff has been known to make sport of Microsoft as a big, bloated software company for years. Ironically, for a company that once spouted a "No Software" slogan, Salesforce.com really is all about software, it's just that the software runs from its own data centers, not on local desktops, but hey, marketing.
Last fall there was a sign of flexibility in Salesforce's deployment model when it said it would work with Hewlett-Packard(s hpq) to build a version of Salesforce to run on HP's converged hardware. Up till then, the company pretty much built its franchise on Oracle's database and middleware and Dell or other standard hardware -- with some vague handwaving last year around running on Oracle's exa-boxes. Not sure where that ever went.
But i digress... a Salesforce.com and Microsoft deal would take coopetition to a whole new level and show just how much Microsoft wants the world -- including its applications competitors -- to run on Azure.
Some will probably see this deal, if it is completed, as a sign of a transformed Microsoft under new CEO Satya Nadella, but that is not really the case. remember, last year, Microsoft cut a deal to run software from rival Oracle (at least its database, middleware and hypervisor) on Azure and former Microosft CEO Steve Ballmer presided over that press event.
It's still unclear to me how much of Microsoft's own business software -- the Dynamics ERP and CRM lines -- Dynamics AX ERP and Dynamics GP do now. And there appears to be integration points between Dynamics CRM and Azure, but I will update this when i hear more.
Microsoft and Salesforce.com have not responded for comment. It's early in their day. This story will be updated as appropriate.