raffel served in a number of executive roles with rolm from 1982 to 1989 and with echelon corporation from 1989 to 1996. in 1996, he founded upshot corporation, a software company that delivered internet-based customer relationship management and sales automation tools for businesses. upshot was the first company in silicon valley to provide cloud computing solutions. within two years, upshot released its first product, and by 2003 the company provided services for small, midsize, and large organizations. upshot competed with salesforce.com for market share among large, fortune 1000 companies. in july 2003, salesforce.com filed a complaint against upshot in the united states district court for the northern district of california, claiming that advertising put out by raffel's firm had violated state and federal laws pertaining to fair business competition. raffel argued that his firm's ads were truthful, and noted that salesforce.com had been aggressive in its advertising, particularly in targeting siebel systems. he was quoted as saying, "salesforce suing over an ad is like the person who kills both his parents and then asks for mercy because he's an orphan."