Salesforce is buying Slack for close to $28 billion

Here’s some news you can gossip with your coworkers about on Slack.

Salesforce is buying the communications platform for $27.7 billion in cash and stock, the company announced this afternoon shortly after the markets closed.

It’s expected to close in the second quarter of Salesforce’s fiscal year 2022, which means by July of that year.

“This is a match made in heaven,” Salesforce chair and CEO Marc Benioff says in a written statement. “Together, Salesforce and Slack will shape the future of enterprise software and transform the way everyone works in the all-digital, work-from-anywhere world.”

Reports of the deal leaked last week, sending shares of Slack Technologies up as high as 28%.