Salesforce, a US-listed software-as-a-service platform for companies, has linked with three European venture capital firms for an Innovation Challenge for local start-ups.
The three VCs are Notion Capital, Octopus Investments and MMC Ventures that will look for European start-ups building enterprise cloud applications on the Salesforce platform. The winning startups will have the opportunity to pitch for about €5m ($6.5m) of venture funding.
Steve Garnett, Europe Middle East and Africa chairman of Salesforce, said: “The explosion of growth in Europe’s enterprise app market is fueling innovation across the region. Salesforce is excited to join forces with leading European venture capital firms to launch the Innovation Challenge and reward Europe’s top entrepreneurs and enable them to accelerate their innovation and time to market.”
Separately, Mark Benioff, chief executive of Salesforce, along with other angel investors, including Expedia founder Richard Barton and former Paypal technology head Max Levchin, have invested $5.5m into Sift Sciences, a US-based anti-inline fraud services provider.