When Salesforce Becomes the New Siebel CRM: Are We at the Beginning of Another Replacement Cycle?

They say history repeats itself — and in enterprise software, it often feels unmistakably true. Patterns that once reshaped the industry have a way of resurfacing, sometimes decades later, with striking familiarity. And today, the same signals that once marked the decline of Siebel and the rise of Salesforce appear to be emerging again.Start writing here...

In the early 2000s, Siebel Systems dominated the CRM market. It was powerful but expensive, difficult to implement, and frustrating for users. As customers grew increasingly unhappy, Siebel began to lose momentum.

Oracle stepped in and acquired Siebel in 2005 — but the acquisition didn’t resolve the fundamental issue. Instead, Oracle tried to defend and expand its position by acquiring more and more companies, hoping to slow the erosion:

• PeopleSoft (2004)
• JD Edwards (2004)
• Siebel Systems (2005)
• Hyperion (2007)
• BEA Systems (2008)
• Sun Microsystems (2009)

This strategy created a massive portfolio — but not a cohesive one. Complexity grew, user frustration deepened, and the decline continued.

And that opened the door for a disruptor. Salesforce entered with a radically simpler SaaS model and captured the market Oracle could no longer hold.

After 26 years and nearly $40B in annual revenue, Salesforce is no longer the challenger; it is the incumbent. And things incumbents struggle with are starting to show clearly.

Today, Salesforce customers are voicing the same concerns Siebel customers once did:

• Rapidly increasing prices
• Long, costly implementations
• Low user adoption
• Fragmented experiences across dozens of acquired products
• Admin complexity increasing year after year
• Questionable ROI
• Users simply not enjoying the product

And just like Oracle once did, Salesforce is responding with acquisitions — many of them:

• ExactTarget
• Pardot
• MuleSoft
• Tableau
• Slack
• Demandware
• Heroku
• Buddy Media
• Datorama
• Krux
• …and many more

These acquisitions expanded the ecosystem — but also increased fragmentation. The Salesforce experience today is described by many customers as:

“A giant puzzle of disconnected apps.”

Sound familiar?

Salesforce recently laid off thousands of employees, attributing it to “AI transformation.” But across the industry, people are asking harder questions:

• If AI is the driver, why do Salesforce AI demos still feel incomplete?
• If AI is delivering massive efficiency, why is customer frustration increasing?
• Is AI really the reason — or are growth and margins under pressure?

The AI narrative is inspiring, but many believe the real cause is structural: Salesforce’s model is starting to show the same cracks Siebel once did.

Salesforce did something transformative in 1999 — it led the shift from the On-Premise Era to the SaaS App Era. But 25 years later, organizations are drowning in tools:

• too many apps,
• too many logins,
• too many integrations,
• too many silos,
• too many disconnected workflows.

Companies don’t need more software. They need one intelligent system.

This is why the next major transformation is not simply “SaaS 2.0.” It is the shift to the.