The Total Economic Impact™ Of Salesforce Hyperforce
Cost Savings And Business Benefits Enabled By Hyperforce
A Forrester Total Economic Impact™ Study Commissioned By Salesforce, August 2024
To achieve growth and profit, organizations must understand, connect with, serve, and delight customers.1 Hyperforce helps organizations power global, customer-centric strategies with Salesforce by enhancing platform performance, accelerating innovation, and providing improved security and privacy controls.
Hyperforce is Salesforce’s newest infrastructure architecture, built for the public cloud. Hyperforce delivers the Salesforce platform and applications rapidly and reliably across global regions, giving customers more choice and control over data residency. Salesforce products running on Hyperforce benefit from enhanced standards for compliance, security, and availability and the architecture accelerates Salesforce’s ability to innovate across product clouds and deliver additional business value for customers.
Salesforce commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct a Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study and examine the potential return on investment (ROI) enterprises may realize by upgrading to Hyperforce.2 The purpose of this study is to provide readers with a framework to evaluate the potential financial impact on their organization as a result.
Return on investment (ROI)
89%
Net present value (NPV)
$16K
To better understand the benefits, costs, and risks associated with this investment, Forrester interviewed four representatives with experience with Hyperforce. For the purposes of this study, Forrester aggregated the interviewees’ experiences and combined the results into a single composite organization that is a global company with $1 billion in annual revenue and 1,250 Salesforce users.
Prior to adopting Hyperforce, interviewees’ organizations’ platforms ran on Salesforce’s legacy infrastructure. After upgrading to Hyperforce, their organizations experienced benefits with faster Sandbox refresh times, reduced planned maintenance time, platform performance enhancements, and advanced security.
Key Findings
Quantified benefits. Three-year, risk-adjusted present value (PV) quantified benefits for the composite organization include:
- Reduced Sandbox refresh effort by 4 hours. Salesforce Sandboxes replicate production environments, allowing the composite organization to safely plan, build, test, and deploy new features or settings. By moving to Hyperforce, the composite organization reduces the effort required for its Salesforce developers to refresh Sandboxes, enabling it to test and push out platform updates faster. Over three years, the labor savings total $3,000.
- Reduced read-only time for scheduled platform maintenance by 2.5 hours. On Hyperforce, annual planned maintenance time is reduced from 3 hours to just 30 minutes, improving user productivity and avoiding revenue losses. Over three years, the savings are worth nearly $31,000.
Unquantified benefits. Benefits that provide value for the composite organization but are not quantified for this study include:
- Better security. The composite organization improves the security of its Salesforce implementation with Hyperforce’s Zero Trust and data encryption features.
- Performance improvements.3 The composite organization experiences platform improvements with Hyperforce including reduced latency, improved page load times, and faster batch processing.
Costs. Three-year, risk-adjusted PV costs for the composite organization include:
- Labor costs for migration preparation and training. There is no additional cost associated with residing on the Hyperforce infrastructure. The composite incurs labor costs of $18,000 associated with efforts to prepare for the migration and training on Hyperforce.
The representative interviews and financial analysis found that a composite organization experiences benefits of $34,000 over three years versus costs of $18,000, adding up to a net present value (NPV) of $16,000 and an ROI of 89%.
Key Statistics
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Return on investment (ROI)
89%
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Benefits PV
$34K
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Net present value (NPV)
$16K
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Payback
16 months
Benefits (Three-Year)
Sandbox refresh efficiency Reduced planned downtimeTEI Framework And Methodology
From the information provided in the interviews, Forrester constructed a Total Economic Impact™ framework for those organizations considering an investment in Hyperforce.
The objective of the framework is to identify the cost, benefit, flexibility, and risk factors that affect the investment decision. Forrester took a multistep approach to evaluate the impact that Hyperforce can have on an organization.
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Due Diligence
Interviewed Salesforce stakeholders and Forrester analysts to gather data relative to Hyperforce.
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Interviews
Interviewed four representatives at organizations using Hyperforce to obtain data about costs, benefits, and risks.
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Composite Organization
Designed a composite organization based on characteristics of the interviewees’ organizations.
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Financial Model Framework
Constructed a financial model representative of the interviews using the TEI methodology and risk-adjusted the financial model based on issues and concerns of the interviewees.
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Case Study
Employed four fundamental elements of TEI in modeling the investment impact: benefits, costs, flexibility, and risks. Given the increasing sophistication of ROI analyses related to IT investments, Forrester’s TEI methodology provides a complete picture of the total economic impact of investment decisions. Please see Appendix A for additional information on the TEI methodology.
Disclosures
Readers should be aware of the following:
This study is commissioned by Salesforce and delivered by Forrester Consulting. It is not meant to be used as a competitive analysis.
Forrester makes no assumptions as to the potential ROI that other organizations will receive. Forrester strongly advises that readers use their own estimates within the framework provided in the study to determine the appropriateness of an investment in Hyperforce.
Salesforce reviewed and provided feedback to Forrester, but Forrester maintains editorial control over the study and its findings and does not accept changes to the study that contradict Forrester’s findings or obscure the meaning of the study.
Salesforce provided the customer names for the interviews but did not participate in the interviews.
Drivers leading to the Hyperforce investment
Interviews
| Role | Industry | Operational Reach | Annual Revenue | Employees |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| VP of architecture | Entertainment | US headquarters Global operations | $20 billion | 12,800 |
| Salesforce Service Cloud lead | Manufacturing | New Zealand headquarters Global operations | $1.2 billion | 5,000 to 10,000 |
| CIO of Americas | Manufacturing | China headquarters Global operations South America business unit | Business unit: $1 billion | Business unit: 2,000 |
| Manager of global sales operations | Trade management | Canada headquarters Global operations | $73 million | 3,000 |
Migration Objectives And Expected Outcomes
Prior to Hyperforce, the interviewees’ organizations utilized Salesforce’s legacy infrastructure. Two of the interviewees’ organizations chose to upgrade to Hyperforce after it was introduced in 2020. The other two were notified that the migration would automatically take place on a future date.
The interviewees noted the following objectives or outcomes they anticipated by moving to Hyperforce:
- Reduced planned maintenance time. The VP of architecture at an entertainment company shared that their organization adopted Hyperforce with the objective of reducing planned maintenance time. With the legacy infrastructure, the organization experienced planned maintenance windows lasting several hours, which at times hampered platform operations. Hyperforce offered planned maintenance windows of just 30 minutes — a key factor that drove the interviewee’s decision to migrate.
- Utilization of Data Cloud features. The Salesforce Service Cloud lead at a manufacturing company noted that Hyperforce would enable their organization to use the functionalities of Data Cloud that were not available on the legacy infrastructure. They said: “Hyperforce was the architecture that Salesforce was developing and moving forward with for Data Cloud. In order for us to achieve what we needed to from a Data Cloud perspective, we made the strategic move to migrate because all of the functionalities were built for that platform architecture.”
- Data residency. The Salesforce Service Cloud lead at a manufacturing company shared that their organization’s Data Cloud strategy required the organization to migrate their Salesforce instance from Japan to a GDPR-compliant region. They noted Hyperforce enabled their organization to easily migrate their data into a compliant region of their choice, which was an added benefit of migrating to the new infrastructure architecture.
- Improved performance. The manager of global sales operations at a trade management company said that they looked forward to better platform performance, including faster Sandbox refreshes, as a result of the migration.
Composite Organization
Based on the interviews, Forrester constructed a TEI framework, a composite company, and an ROI analysis that illustrates the areas financially affected. The composite organization is representative of the four interviewees, and it is used to present the aggregate financial analysis in the next section. The composite organization has the following characteristics:
Description of composite. The composite organization is a global company with $1 billion in annual revenue and 5,000 employees. The Salesforce platform is a business-critical application for the organization, and 1,250 of its employees are Salesforce licensees.
Deployment characteristics. The composite organization migrates to Hyperforce from Salesforce’s legacy infrastructure.
Quantified benefit data as applied to the composite
Total Benefits
| Ref. | Benefit | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | Total | Present Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Atr | Sandbox refresh efficiency | $1,212 | $1,212 | $1,212 | $3,635 | $3,013 |
| Btr | Reduced planned maintenance time | $12,273 | $12,273 | $12,273 | $36,819 | $30,521 |
| Total benefits (risk-adjusted) | $13,485 | $13,485 | $13,485 | $40,454 | $33,534 | |
Sandbox Refresh Efficiency
Evidence and data. Salesforce Sandboxes replicate production environments, enabling developers and admins to safely plan, build, test, and deploy new features or settings. The manager of global sales operations at a trade management company noted a reduction in time and effort required to refresh Sandboxes with Hyperforce, which enabled the organization to test and push out platform updates faster. They shared that creating a full copy of their organization’s Salesforce production environment often took more than a day on the legacy infrastructure. With the move to Hyperforce, this process could be completed within 1 to 2 hours and reduced Salesforce developer effort by 4 hours.
Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:
- The composite organization conducts four Sandboxes refreshes each year.
- On Hyperforce, each Sandbox refresh requires 4 fewer hours of Salesforce developer effort when compared to the legacy infrastructure.
- The annual fully burdened salary of a Salesforce developer is $175,000.
Risks. Forrester recognizes that these results may not be representative of all experiences. The impact of this benefit will vary depending on the following:
- The number of Sandboxes and frequency of refreshes.
- Sandbox complexities, including data volumes, customizations, and configurations.
- The fully burdened salary of a Salesforce developer.
Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $3,000.
Sandbox Refresh Efficiency
| Ref. | Metric | Source | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A1 | Annual Sandbox refreshes | Interviews | 4 | 4 | 4 | |
| A2 | Reduction in Sandbox refresh effort (hours) | Interviews | 4 | 4 | 4 | |
| A3 | Annual burdened Salesforce developer salary | Composite | $175,000 | $175,000 | $175,000 | |
| At | Sandbox refresh efficiency | A1*A2*A3/2,080 | $1,346 | $1,346 | $1,346 | |
| Risk adjustment | ↓10% | |||||
| Atr | Sandbox refresh efficiency (risk-adjusted) | $1,212 | $1,212 | $1,212 | ||
| Three-year total: $3,635 | Three-year present value: $3,013 | |||||
Reduced Planned Maintenance Time
Evidence and data. Interviewees reported a reduction in time required for platform maintenance events after upgrading to Hyperforce. The VP of architecture at an entertainment company shared that their organization avoided 2 hours of planned maintenance time per year, reducing the burden on platform-reliant business operations. Similarly, the Salesforce Service Cloud lead at a manufacturing company shared that their organization had experienced 4 to 5 hours of time for planned maintenance per year on Salesforce’s legacy architecture. With the move to Hyperforce, planned maintenance time was reduced to just 30 minutes.
Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:
- The composite organization experiences 3 hours of planned time for platform maintenance on the legacy infrastructure.
- With the migration to Hyperforce, annual planned maintenance is reduced to 30 minutes.
- The cost of platform maintenance time per hour is $38,504. This cost includes a 20% reduction in productivity for each Salesforce user and a reduction in hourly revenue generated by the platform.4
- The likelihood of planned maintenance windows impacting user productivity and revenue generation is 15%, which takes into account that maintenance windows are typically scheduled outside of standard business hours to minimize impacts to business operations.
Risks. Forrester recognizes that these results may not be representative of all experiences. The impact of this benefit will vary depending on the following:
- The number of planned maintenance events per year.
- The criticality of an organization’s Salesforce platform to user productivity and revenue generation.
Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $31,000.
Reduced Planned Maintenance Time
| Ref. | Metric | Source | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| B1 | Planned maintenance time prior to Hyperforce (hours) | Interviews | 3 | 3 | 3 | |
| B2 | Planned maintenance time on Hyperforce (hours) | Interviews | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.5 | |
| B3 | Avoided planned maintenance time (hours) | B1-B2 | 2.5 | 2.5 | 2.5 | |
| B4 | Cost of planned maintenance time per hour | Composite | $38,504 | $38,504 | $38,504 | |
| B5 | Likelihood of planned maintenance time impact | Composite | 15% | 15% | 15% | |
| Bt | Reduced planned maintenance time | B3*B4*B5 | $14,439 | $14,439 | $14,439 | |
| Risk adjustment | ↓15% | |||||
| Btr | Reduced planned maintenance time (risk-adjusted) | $12,273 | $12,273 | $12,273 | ||
| Three-year total: $36,819 | Three-year present value: $30,521 | |||||
Unquantified Benefits
Interviewees mentioned the following additional benefits that their organizations experienced:
- Advanced security. Interviewees highlighted the value of enhanced security features on Hyperforce, including its Zero Trust architecture and data encryption. The manager of global sales operations at a trade management company noted that the enhanced security on Hyperforce provided greater security assurance for its IT team.
- Performance improvements.5 Interviewees reported platform performance improvements on Hyperforce. The VP of architecture at an entertainment company measured 20% faster average page load times and 25% faster batch processing times as a result of moving to Hyperforce. Similarly, the CIO of Americas at a manufacturing company noted performance improvements, including reduced latency and faster transaction response times.
Flexibility
The value of flexibility is unique to each customer. There are multiple scenarios in which a customer might upgrade to Hyperforce to later realize additional uses and business opportunities, including:
- Data residency and compliance. Hyperforce offers in-country data storage options, providing flexibility around data residency and related compliance requirements for the interviewees’ organizations. The CIO of Americas at a manufacturing company expected the data residency capabilities would be valuable as their organization expanded its use of Salesforce to other business regions in the future. The VP of architecture at an entertainment company said: “If we were to have a significant amount of contact information that needed to be co-resident somewhere, we do see that flexibility. For example, we could store contacts in another instance on Hyperforce in Germany.”
- Developer efficiency and speed of innovation. Salesforce continues to release new developer features on Hyperforce that the interviewees’ organizations can take advantage of to drive productivity and innovation. For example, sandboxing features such as Quick Clone enable faster development and testing, which several interviewees noted could be advantageous to utilize in the future.
- Reduced risk of unauthorized access. Hyperforce allows Salesforce to offer even more powerful data security and controls. Customers that upgrade to Hyperforce can combine its native encryption features with other Salesforce security products that transparently encrypt tenant-level data and offer flexible key management options, providing a multilayered approach to their security posture.
- Ability to unlock new products and services. Hyperforce accelerates Salesforce’s ability to innovate and deliver additional business value to customers. Salesforce’s newest products and services will be released on Hyperforce moving forward, including Einstein 1, Data Cloud, EU Operating Zone, and more. Existing Salesforce products and new innovations operate on Hyperforce to provide enhanced benefits, including better localized performance and availability. For the interviewees’ organizations, Hyperforce enables them to leverage these solutions and ultimately capture greater platform value.
Flexibility can also be quantified when evaluated as part of a specific project (described in more detail in Appendix A).
Quantified cost data as applied to the composite
Total Costs
| Ref. | Cost | Initial | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | Total | Present Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ctr | Migration preparation and training efforts | $17,756 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $17,756 | $17,756 |
| Total costs (risk-adjusted) | $17,756 | $0 | $0 | $0 | $17,756 | $17,756 | |
Migration Preparation And Training Efforts
Evidence and data. While there is no additional cost associated with residing on Hyperforce’s infrastructure architecture, the interviewees’ organizations incurred internal labor and training costs associated with the migration to Hyperforce.
- Interviewees reported preparation timelines of between one to five months for the migration. Internal labor required for the preparation process varied across the interviewees’ organizations based on the complexity of their Salesforce implementations, ranging between just a few weeks’ worth of preparation and up to hundreds of hours of effort across Salesforce IT teams.
- Interviewees noted that they leveraged the Hyperforce Assistant to guide the migration, which provided a summary list of tasks to complete during the preparation process. Across the board, interviewees shared that testing was a critical activity during the preparation process. Overall, interviewees highlighted that the migration process went smoothly on the day of its execution.
- Interviewees reported minimal labor requirements for training on Hyperforce. The CIO of Americas at a manufacturing company said that an internal Salesforce specialist spent 3 to 4 hours reviewing official training on Hyperforce.
Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:
- IT effort spent on preparation for the migration to Hyperforce totals 195 hours.
- The annual fully burdened cost of a Salesforce resource is $175,000.
- Three Salesforce resources each receive 3 hours of training on Hyperforce.
Risks. Forrester recognizes that these results may not be representative of all experiences. The impact of this benefit will vary depending on the following:
- Platform complexity and customization.
- Fully burdened salaries for Salesforce resources.
Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this cost upward by 5%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $18,000.
Migration Preparation And Training Efforts
| Ref. | Metric | Source | Initial | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C1 | Migration preparation effort (hours) | Interviews | 195 | ||||
| C2 | Annual fully burdened salary per Salesforce resource | Composite | $175,000 | ||||
| C3 | Subtotal: Migration preparation labor (rounded) | C1*C2/2,080 | $16,406 | ||||
| C4 | Salesforce resources receiving training | Interviews | 3 | ||||
| C5 | Training per Salesforce resource | Interviews | 2 | ||||
| C6 | Subtotal: Training costs (rounded) | C2/2,080*C4*C5 | $505 | ||||
| Ct | Migration preparation and training efforts | C2/2,080*C4*C5 | $16,911 | $0 | $0 | $0 | |
| Risk adjustment | ↑5% | ||||||
| Ctr | Migration preparation and training efforts (risk-adjusted) | $17,756 | $0 | $0 | $0 | ||
| Three-year total: $17,756 | Three-year present value: $17,756 | ||||||
Consolidated Three-Year Risk-Adjusted Metrics
Cash Flow Chart (Risk-Adjusted)
Total costs Total benefits Cumulative net benefits Initial Year 1 Year 2 Year 3-
The financial results calculated in the Benefits and Costs sections can be used to determine the ROI, NPV, and payback period for the composite organization’s investment. Forrester assumes a yearly discount rate of 10% for this analysis.
These risk-adjusted ROI, NPV, and payback period values are determined by applying risk-adjustment factors to the unadjusted results in each Benefit and Cost section.
Cash Flow Analysis (Risk-Adjusted Estimates)
| Initial | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | Total | Present Value | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total costs | ($17,756) | $0 | $0 | $0 | ($17,756) | ($17,756) |
| Total benefits | $0 | $13,485 | $13,485 | $13,485 | $40,454 | $33,534 |
| Net benefits | ($17,756) | $13,485 | $13,485 | $13,485 | $22,698 | $15,778 |
| ROI | 89% | |||||
| Payback | 16 months | |||||
Appendix A: Total Economic Impact
Total Economic Impact is a methodology developed by Forrester Research that enhances a company’s technology decision-making processes and assists vendors in communicating the value proposition of their products and services to clients. The TEI methodology helps companies demonstrate, justify, and realize the tangible value of IT initiatives to both senior management and other key business stakeholders.
Total Economic Impact Approach
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Benefits represent the value delivered to the business by the product. The TEI methodology places equal weight on the measure of benefits and the measure of costs, allowing for a full examination of the effect of the technology on the entire organization.
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Costs consider all expenses necessary to deliver the proposed value, or benefits, of the product. The cost category within TEI captures incremental costs over the existing environment for ongoing costs associated with the solution.
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Flexibility represents the strategic value that can be obtained for some future additional investment building on top of the initial investment already made. Having the ability to capture that benefit has a PV that can be estimated.
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Risks measure the uncertainty of benefit and cost estimates given: 1) the likelihood that estimates will meet original projections and 2) the likelihood that estimates will be tracked over time. TEI risk factors are based on “triangular distribution.”
The initial investment column contains costs incurred at “time 0” or at the beginning of Year 1 that are not discounted. All other cash flows are discounted using the discount rate at the end of the year. PV calculations are calculated for each total cost and benefit estimate. NPV calculations in the summary tables are the sum of the initial investment and the discounted cash flows in each year. Sums and present value calculations of the Total Benefits, Total Costs, and Cash Flow tables may not exactly add up, as some rounding may occur.
Appendix B: Endnotes
1 Source: The Salesforce Consulting Services Landscape, Q1 2023, Forrester Research, Inc., February 1, 2023.
2 Total Economic Impact is a methodology developed by Forrester Research that enhances a company’s technology decision-making processes and assists vendors in communicating the value proposition of their products and services to clients. The TEI methodology helps companies demonstrate, justify, and realize the tangible value of IT initiatives to both senior management and other key business stakeholders.
3 Interviewees reported subjective performance improvements as a result of migrating to Hyperforce. Due to a variety of influencing factors, performance improvements are not guaranteed with Hyperforce.
4 Source: Identify And Estimate The Costs Of Downtime On Your Business, Forrester Research, Inc., January 12, 2021.
5 Interviewees reported subjective performance improvements as a result of migrating to Hyperforce. Due to a variety of influencing factors, performance improvements are not guaranteed with Hyperforce.
6 Source: Grow Your Business With Data And AI, Forrester Research, Inc., May 21, 2024
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