Jack Dorsey, the former CEO of Twitter and current head of Block, Inc., is once again trying to shake up the enterprise software world. This week, his company unveiled a new workplace collaboration tool called Buzz, designed to compete with Microsoft Teams and Salesforce Slack. Built on open-source principles and featuring AI-powered functions, Buzz aims to redefine how teams and agents interact in the workplace.
What Buzz Is Trying To Accomplish
Buzz is being introduced as a unified workspace where users, AI agents, and developers can collaborate in the same place. According to Dorsey, the platform combines chat, code repositories, and workflows into one centralized environment. It operates on Nostr, the decentralized messaging protocol known for its censorship resistance and often linked to Twitter alternatives. Block employees are already using Buzz internally as part of the company’s digital strategy.
In a post on X, Dorsey outlined the tool's goal: reducing Block’s dependence on external services like Slack and GitHub. Buzz supports multiple AI models and agent systems, which means organizations can use popular tools such as Claude Code or Block’s proprietary goose framework. This flexibility allows teams to bring in their own preferred AI solutions.
This launch is part of a broader strategy for Block, which is shifting its focus toward AI-driven technologies and financial efficiency. The company has announced major workforce reductions, sharpened its profit goals, and increased its full-year revenue expectations after reporting better-than-anticipated first-quarter results in May. These changes have boosted investor optimism, with Block’s shares climbing 19% year to date. That’s a significant contrast to the -19% drop in Microsoft’s stock and the -38% plunge in Salesforce’s value during the same period.
Earlier this week, both BMO Capital and Cantor Fitzgerald raised their price targets for Block, raising them to $85 and $95, respectively. Although the stock closed at $77.46 on Thursday, retail investor sentiment has cooled slightly on platforms like Stocktwits, shifting from 'bullish' to 'neutral.' Some traders, however, still see potential in the recent upward trend of Block’s shares.
The enterprise collaboration market is already tightly held by Microsoft and Salesforce, with Teams and Slack capturing much of the demand. Even as interest in AI-driven tools grows, it remains to be seen whether a new open-source platform from a company better known for payment solutions and crypto products can carve out a meaningful share.
Buzz’s emphasis on open-source design and AI-powered capabilities might resonate with developers or privacy-conscious businesses, but widespread adoption—especially among large corporations—could take time. Block’s stock, while on a positive trajectory, has generally remained within a narrow trading range for the past three years. Investors will be watching to see whether enterprise users actually adopt Buzz and if the tool proves to be more than an experimental addition to Block’s product lineup.
In the short term, the real test for Buzz lies in its ability to attract real-world users and demonstrate a unique value proposition that sets it apart from the established competition. If it can do that, Block might finally break into a new sector and diversify its business beyond payments and consumer finance.