It's usually tough finding the right gift for an entrepreneur. Hey, the best thing would probably be a loan or some customers, right?

OK, being realistic, there are some gifts to consider. Let's take a look:

The Cloud: It's all the rage right now -- that is, on-demand software services. The good news is that much of it is affordable. Take a look at Salesforce.com (CRM). The company has a small business edition of its customer relationship management (CRM) offering that comes to only $50 per year.

Continue reading Entrepreneur's Journal: Best holiday gift for the entrepreneur?

Entrepreneur's Journal: Best holiday gift for the entrepreneur? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sun, 13 Dec 2009 17:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Back in 1999, former Intuit employees -- René Lacerte and Martin Gates -- saw an opportunity in building an affordable, web-based payroll system for small business. So, they started a company called PayCycle.

It was certainly prescient. In fact, this week PayCycle sold to Intuit (NASDAQ: INTU) for $170 million.

Besides having a strong on-demand offering, PayCycle also has a large customer base, which comes to roughly 85,000 small businesses. No doubt, this will be a lucrative cross-sell opportunity for Intuit. At the same time, PayCycle will help deal with the intense competitive environment, which includes players like ADP (NYSE: N) and Paychex (NASDAQ: PAYX).

Continue reading Intuit scoops up PayCycle for $170 million

Intuit scoops up PayCycle for $170 million originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 03 Jun 2009 09:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.