REDMOND, Wash. — Nov. 2, 2005 — Microsoft Corp. today announced it has agreed to acquire media-streams.com AG, a software company based in Zurich, Switzerland, that develops communications applications based on voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) technology. Microsoft plans to apply media-streams.com’s technology, people and intellectual property to accelerate the delivery of its unified communications vision, bringing together various modes of communication (e-mail; instant messaging; short message service; voice/telephony; and audio, video and Web conferencing), breaking down the silos of communication and extending the unified communications experience to information workers.
The technology media-streams.com has developed will help Microsoft deliver to customers an improved integrated VoIP experience based on the Microsoft® Office Real-Time Collaboration platform, Microsoft Office Live Communications Server.
“We are in lock-step with Microsoft’s vision of bringing voice and data collaboration together, and we have built our business around delivering enhanced real-time communications for enterprise and small to midsize customers,” said Erich Gebhardt, CEO of media-streams.com, a subsidiary of Microsoft. “We’re excited to join Microsoft’s Real-Time Collaboration Group and focus our technologies and people on delivering Microsoft’s vision for unified communications to dramatically improve collaboration.”
VoIP offers information workers more communications flexibility in collaborative scenarios, consistent with Microsoft’s approach to collaboration: to deliver pervasive capabilities that enable people to work together more effectively within the context of their most-used software and services. With this acquisition, Microsoft aims to extend VoIP to communications solutions to improve productivity and business processes, creating new opportunities for Microsoft Real-Time Collaboration customers and partners.
“Integrating voice communications with the rich collaboration capabilities of the Microsoft Office System will enable exciting new collaboration scenarios that will improve individual and team collaboration,” said Anoop Gupta, corporate vice president of the Real-Time Collaboration Group at Microsoft. “media-streams.com’s VoIP technology will become available as part of the Real-Time Collaboration platform from Microsoft, significantly enhancing the value delivered to customers and opportunities for partners. The acquisition accelerates our ability to deliver on our vision of unified communications.”
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.
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