Salesforce agreed to acquire Cresta, whose AI voice agents handle customer service calls, for an undisclosed price that The Information puts at about $2.7 billion. Cresta’s software can resolve a call from start to finish or coach a human rep while the conversation is happening, and its customers include Marriott, Comcast, and Alaska Airlines. Salesforce plans to fold Cresta into Service Cloud but said Cresta will keep working with the contact center and phone systems its customers already use. Cresta is Salesforce’s second multibillion-dollar customer service acquisition this year, after it agreed to buy Fin, formerly Intercom, for $3.6 billion in June.
