When you need to go looking for a non-native Salesforce solution, you’d normally go to the AppExchange, right? Finding everything you need is accessible with a few clicks, and the scope of app companies available is pretty extensive.
However, what if you could cut the searching time down and still make the most of some of the best Salesforce ISVs available? With AscendX – one of the latest cloud enterprises – this dream could become a reality.
What the Ecosystem Needs
For a bit of background, it’s important to start with an observation of the Salesforce ecosystem as a whole. The ecosystem continues to experience strong growth, and this comes with great implications for the Salesforce partner market. After all, we now know that the partner ecosystem is forecasted to be over six times larger than Salesforce itself by 2026.
With this kind of forecast comes both great opportunity and great competition. The top-performing ISVs will need to demonstrate a deep understanding of the market, strong connections to others in the ecosystem, and the ability to deliver something that its competitors fighting to fill the same gap can’t.
From a customer perspective, these are all values that they will be looking for in a company/app on the AppExchange, so it’s imperative that they’re delivered. However, obstacles such as rising costs and a lack of funding, resources, and business expertise can easily hinder an ISV’s path to success, meaning that great solutions don’t make it off the ground.
Alongside this, we know that the tech market is changing in a myriad of ways, and it can be difficult to know where to turn in terms of business decisions; fostering a successful ISV is much harder now than it was 10 years ago. Traditional partnerships in the ISV space do exist, but they don’t always honor an ISV’s needs and interests fully, with the cost and profit bones of contention constantly looming.
This is where a solution like AscendX comes in: an ISV partnership company dedicated to supporting ISVs through purposeful acquisition, industry guidance, and scale-up opportunities.
What Is AscendX?
AscendX is an enterprise software solution that operates mission-critical software solutions running on leading CRM platforms. Their main focus is acquiring skilled companies in the ecosystem and developing their portfolio to create solutions that fill gaps in the CRM product market.
Founded in February 2023, AscendX currently have six apps in their portfolio, and focuses heavily on cross-selling and bundling to offer impactful and thematic solutions.
Ufuk Civilo, AscendX’s Co-Founder and CEO, emphasizes that despite being a company that acquires ISVs, the focus always remains on how they can help ISVs meet their business goals and keep the founders consistently at the helm. “We leverage our ecosystem expertise to help our portfolio companies outperform their peers,” he says. “We keep the founders on board, helping them along the way.”
Mike Tetlow, AscendX’s CTO, says that a key way that they support these ISVs is by “letting them focus on what they can uniquely do best.” They do this by removing a lot of the admin tasks that ISVs – especially smaller ones – can quickly become burdened by.
AscendX portfolio companies have access to AscendX resources related to Go-to-Market, product development, and central functions including finance and operations. Backed by a team of three advisors, ISVs are provided with relevant guidance to make decisions, steer the company in the right direction, and help the founders.
“We want to help ISV founders scale up fast, [and] we want to scale fast in the verticals we believe in”
Ufuk Civilo, Co-Founder and CEO of AscendX
What ISVs do AscendX Look For?
When I asked about the kinds of ISVs that AscendX looks to work with, Ufuk assured me that the choices they make are very deliberate but purposeful. “We’ve spoken to more than 100 founders, looking for mission criticals in our chosen verticals,” he said. Using a “playbook” of sorts, they look to answer the question: “Who can I help?”
“We identify which verticals to focus on and then reach out to their founders,” Ufuk says. “We look for product-orientated founders.”
Although AscendX focuses a lot on the wider CRM space rather than just the Salesforce one, products and their objectives are incredibly important.
AscendX vs. AppExchange
The verticals – or niches – that Ufuk talks about play a core role in AscendXs’s mission, and are ultimately what set them apart from the AppExchange.
“Ultimately, it’s all about creating a platform where they [customers] can find everything they need in one place,” Ufuk says.
With AppExchange, you have the benefit of a platform that allows you to find a solution to (almost) everything you need, but it can quickly become overwhelming if you’re after something specific or don’t quite know where to look. AscendX on the other hand, operates on their own verticals, acquiring business solutions with certain themes and strategies that their customers are looking for. It’s a much more tailored approach, benefitting both the ISVs and their customers.
The Customers
Pivoting the attention back to the customer, AscendX does not fail to have them in mind. Mike says that by keeping their portfolio of ISVs supported, the ISVs can focus more on delivering better value to their customers.
Not only that, but he also hopes that in the future, AscendX’s solutions will start looking more and more homogenous, making it easier for customers to configure all solutions in the portfolio.
The Future of AscendX
Although AscendX is already making quite the impression in the currently tumultuous ecosystem, its goals are refreshingly adventurous. They’re currently aiming to build up to a portfolio of 50 companies, continuing with the vertical and founder-focused approach.
You’ll also find them sponsoring AppExchange Live London’s Networking Reception on Thursday 29th February.
Summary
As the entire Salesforce ecosystem faces significant shifts and changes, knowing where to look for solutions as both an ISV and a customer can be tricky. AscendX is just one of the companies that are working to simplify this process, providing much-needed support and guidance for ISVs, allowing them to deliver better value to their customers.
For more information on AscendX and what they do, be sure to check out AscendX’s website.
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