Report: Slack strengthens grip on the enterprise with Target, BBC

Dive Brief:

Slack, one of the pioneering communication platforms, just added Target, BBC, Liberty Mutual Group, Workday and E*Trade to its list of customers, reports Reuters. This brings Slack's customer base using its enterprise platform, Enterprise Grid, to more than 150 businesses, said CEO Stewart Butterfield, in an interview with Reuters.
However, analysts warn that Slack's potential customers may become "okay enough with the Google and Microsoft solutions" if Slack's value proposition isn't readily defined, according to the report.
Competitors are also making headway with their offerings. On Monday, Microsoft released the largest slew of new features since the release of Teams last year, according to a company announcement. Among the new features is the ability for users to input hyperlinks from programs like Office 365.

Dive Insight:

The communication platform market is expected to be worth about $49.5 billion by 2021. Employees are continually using mobile apps and means of personal communication that they also want in their job.

Communication platforms enable employees to easily converse, share documents and collaborate on projects, and the companies that are able to offer all three are the ones that will lead the market.

Currently Microsoft holds the top spot with about 125,000 organizations, followed by Workplace by Facebook and then Slack. Slack has a relatively modest following compared to Microsoft with about 50,000 organizations.

However, Slack has long been seen as the market's most "innovative" company despite having a smaller customer base when compared to relative newcomers Microsoft Teams and Workplace by Facebook. Workplace has high-profile customers too, including Walmart and Starbucks, but Slack's new enterprise additions make a promising case for acquiring more major names.

But the software giant is taking some cues from Slack's portfolio. Microsoft's rollout of new features are noticeably similar to Slack's existing ones. However, that is the name of the game. Both companies offer a directory of apps that allow users to search for applications by categories like project management, analytics or BI.