Best of Breed vs. Best of Vendor – Why Blackbaud Was (Sales)Forced to Buy Convio
The Blackbaud/Convio deal is not done (and in fact has been delayed for a third time), but it has sparked an increasingly heated debate about what the post Blackvio/ConBaud world will look like. The easy answer is less choice, less innovation, and higher costs. Based on previous Blackbaud acquisitions, those are good bets.
What is harder to answer is the question of what is driving Blackbaud to make this very expensive acquisition which will saddle them with over $300 million in debt. Taking out a competitor; buying revenue (especially Convio's valuable subscription revenue); and obtaining clients they couldn't win with their existing products are all good possibilities and certainly have factored into past acquisition decisions.
But I think there is something deeper going on. Blackbaud is a believer in the Best of Vendor business model which says that clients should buy all of their "solutions" from one company. The theory is that clients benefit from the vendor's ability to integrate multiple functions...