Phil Wainewright writes about salesforce.com as the "exit strategy" for AppExchange members as it announces its acquisition of Kieden in the search engine marketing space.
I asked a similar question about SAP's ecosystem here.
The questions I asked are just as relevant for salesforce.com
Who would be part of the inner circle? Would customers decide or would
SAP salesforce.com play favorites? Would SAP salesforce.com acquire those that made it to the inner
circle as it did recently with Sendia and now, Kieden Virsa? How would others in the outer
circles behave? With all this giddy attention at the center of it all,
will SAP salesforce.com forget where "True North" is?