Salesforce (CRM) has set sights on artificial intelligence opportunities in Southeast Asia. While the company operates an AI research lab in Singapore, it has announced plans to invest $1 billion in the island nation. The investment will go towards expanding the company’s products and fueling the adoption of its new AI platform.
Salesforce $1B Investment
The customer management software company has already unveiled Agentforce, its AI-powered platform designed to complete tasks such as customer service with limited human intervention. The solution has attracted strong interest and use from high-flying customers like Singapore Airlines.
Salesforce insists Agentforce has the potential to ease Singapore’s persistent labour challenges and enhance the workforce and businesses. The initiative comes on the heels of a recent $500 million investment in Saudi Arabia and an additional $500 million funding in Argentina.
Faced with stiff competition in the provision of human resources solutions amid the AI boom, the cloud software leader has sought to broaden its AI and cloud offerings to other markets. The firm has been investing in Singapore for nearly twenty years, having established its first international AI Research centre there in 2019. Its clientele in the region includes Singapore Airlines, Grab, M1, FairPrice Group, and Ocean Network Express.
The company has already entered into an agreement with Singapore Airlines to incorporate Agentforce, Salesforce’s AI component, Einstein, within Service Cloud, and Data Cloud into the airline’s customer case management framework. The two companies also aim to create AI solutions for airlines at Salesforce’s AI Research Center.
Nevertheless, Salesforce is not the only company pursuing growth opportunities in Southeast Asia. Amazon Web Services plans to invest an additional $9 billion over the next five years in Singapore to enhance its cloud infrastructure and services. On the other hand, Microsoft plans to invest $2.2 billion in Malaysia and $1.7 billion in Indonesia to pursue AI opportunities in the region.
ServiceNow Moveworks Acquisition
Meanwhile, ServiceNow (NOW) is in the midst of acquiring the business process automation firm Moveworks for $2.85 billion. The acquisition is expected to enhance the company’s prospects in the rapidly growing market for AI agents capable of executing digital tasks for individuals, often by utilizing other software applications.
The combined entity should be able to create a robust universal AI assistant and a more insightful AI-driven enterprise search to discover solutions to inquiries, streamline and fulfil daily tasks, and enhance overall productivity.
The merger will enable ServiceNow to integrate its own agent-based AI and automation features with Moveworks’ AI assistant and leverage Moveworks’ expertise in providing AI-driven search functionalities. ServiceNow is among a group of rival software powerhouses, such as Salesforce, Microsoft (MSFT) and Alphabet’s (GOOGL) Google, that are developing platforms designed to empower organizations to automate tasks using AI agents.
While ServiceNow’s AI agents mainly focus on automating specific backend functions, Moveworks has created a sophisticated front-end AI assistant capable of handling diverse tasks. The same interface is utilized by individuals requesting tasks and those typically carrying them out.
