Like a lot of entrepreneurs, Matt Dillon comes from a family of founders. Also, like a lot of entrepreneurs, he has a wide range of interests. In college, he majored in sports management, information systems, marketing, business and economics.
Possibly the only thing he didn’t study was acting. (That’s a different Matt Dillon.)
After starting his career in software development, the San Diego native went on to found “three or four” companies in Omaha during the early days of the web, as part of the initial wave of developers working in mobile and database-driven cloud architectures. Then the dot-com era bubble burst and markets worldwide took a bath on the tech industry. So, Dillon went back to work at a software company. But he couldn’t shake the entrepreneurial itch.
“My whole family comes from entrepreneurs,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s genetic or what, but it is something I’m passionate about.”
Dillon wouldn’t stay out of the startup game for long. In 2008, he and co-founder Jack Pereira launched Nuvem Consulting, a cloud consultancy specializing in the Salesforce platform. Nuvem builds custom software for enterprises that use Salesforce to handle business operations, an all-in-one approach that removes data silos and combines under one platform key business functions such as sales, marketing, pricing, quoting, inventory, customer service and billing.
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The decision to focus on the Salesforce ecosystem was pivotal. Dillon had spotted the brand’s potential early in his career while working as a sales director and using Salesforce for customer relationship management software.. He liked the company’s grand vision.
“I kind of saw where Salesforce was headed with the platform, in terms of building onto it beyond just the CRM function,” Dillon said. “We saw that Salesforce’s growth was going to dramatically increase, and we had to scale to that.”
He was not wrong. With an estimated valuation of more than $230 billion, Salesforce is celebrated as one of the top 25 companies to work for and has launched a vast suite of enterprise operations software, such as Work.com. Rumors abound that the company will soon acquire the office-messaging platform Slack. (The tech giant also infamously paid 0% in federal income taxes in 2018, according to a report by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.)
A unique thing about the Salesforce custom application development ecosystem is that so-called competitors will often partner on projects; Nuvem has worked with several Omaha-area companies over the years and developed friendly relations with all of them.
“I call it co-opetition,” Dillon said, forming a portmanteau out of cooperation and competition.
The company that really impressed him was PK formerly ProKarma), an Omaha-based tech experience engineering firm with 20 office locations throughout the U.S., Argentina, India and Mexico, and that maintains partnerships with Adobe, Sitecore, Apigee, Crowdtwist, Automation Anywhere, and of course, Salesforce. Dillon said he appreciated how PK was passionate about their work combining design and tech engineering into customer-focused solutions, an approach he felt paired well with Nuvem’s CRM focus.
And just last month, the two Omaha-born companies made it official. PK acquired Nuvem for an undisclosed amount to spearhead the growth of PK’s Salesforce practice.
“Nuvem Consulting shares our ambition for helping clients simplify lead generation, manage their sales pipeline and cultivate meaningful connections that fuel memorable customer experiences,” said Stuart Price, executive vice president of experience platforms at PK.
Price said Nuvem’s acquisition supports PK’s vision and strategy to develop the most complete Salesforce capabilities and accelerate digital transformation for client enterprises. “We’re excited about their technology and talent, and delighted to welcome the Nuvem Consulting team to the PK family,” he added.
Given the two companies’ great business relationship and complementary strengths, Nuvem was a natural fit for PK, Dillon said. But business wins like these are especially notable during the time of COVID-19, when weekly unemployment claims have ticked up to 778,000.
Not only will all of Nuvem’s employees be given employment at PK, more jobs will be added.
“In fact, we can’t hire quick enough,” Dillon said, mentioning he’d been working through a lot of job descriptions in recent days. “(The Salesforce custom software and consulting space) is so fast-growing that it’s hard for everybody to keep up with all the new acquisitions and the new things that you can do with the platform.”
Meanwhile, Dillon will be trading in his co-founder mystique for the practicable title of vice president of Salesforce Practice for PK.
But what about the entrepreneurial itch? Can he keep away from the game?
“I’ve been a firm believer in the Salesforce ecosystem,” Dillon said. “I’m learning stuff every day. I’m excited about where they’re headed, so I’ve got a lot of life in me in terms of being able to offer value to both clients and thought leadership and to grow the practice.”
“But I also feel like, after joining PK, that they really consider (the entrepreneurial mindset) an asset. You’re empowered to drive and innovate within the organization. I’ve got a window of: as long as they’ll keep me, I’ll stay going.”
