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Leaked Document Lists Potential Acquisition Targets

Salesforce considered buying Seattle company Tableau at one point, according to documents unearthed by “hacktivist” group DC Leaks.

By Rachel Lerman, The Seattle Times

Salesforce considered buying Seattle company Tableau at one point, according to documents unearthed by “hacktivist” group DC Leaks.

A presentation of a list of Salesforce’s potential acquisition targets was reported Tuesday by The Wall Street Journal after the DC group released it. The presentation was found in a dump of emails belonging to former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who is on Salesforce’s board.

The most surprising revelation was that Twitter’s name does not appear on the presentation, which was emailed in May. Salesforce was reportedly interested in buying the social-media company before walking away from the deal this month.

The list includes 14 companies, including LinkedIn, which Salesforce tried to buy before Microsoft closed the deal to acquire the professional networking company.

Salesforce listed both Tableau, a business-intelligence company, and its competitor Qlik Technologies as possible targets. Tableau, given the code name “Tuscany” in the presentation, has had a tough year on the stock market but has not indicated it is up for sale.

A Tableau representative said Wednesday that the company does not comment on rumors or speculation.

It seems unlikely Salesforce is still considering Tableau. The San Francisco business-software developer bought Tableau competitor BeyondCore in September.

Qlik was swooped up since May, when it was acquired in August by private equity firm Thoma Bravo.

Salesforce said in a statement that inclusion on the list wasn’t necessarily an indication Salesforce ever intended to buy a company.

“Salesforce has a disciplined and thoughtful M&A process where we routinely survey the industry landscape across a wide range of companies, but acquire very few,” a spokeswoman said in an email.

Salesforce has spent more than $4 billion on acquisitions this year, according to TechCrunch.

©2016 The Seattle Times Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.