Microsoft has announced that it has purchased a range of technology assets from Australian company Event Zero, which it will use to enhance its Skype for Business offering.
Microsoft said that the acquisition covers "management, reporting and analytics technology" assets related to Event Zero"s UC Commander product suite. Microsoft already uses Event Zero"s software as part of Skype for Business Online - but it said that the acquisition will allow it "to expand and improve the built-in management tools for Skype for Business", adding:
Today, customers of our calling and conferencing services can use the Office 365 administration center to acquire and assign phone numbers to their users in minutes, view reports of audio and video conferencing usage, and quickly access aggregated call quality information using our Call Quality Dashboard. In the future, using the technology acquired today, we will be able to add strong diagnostics and troubleshooting capabilities with even more extensive reporting and analytics for online audio, video conferencing and media streams — all within a unified management and admin system.
Microsoft"s Zig Serafin (Corporate Vice President of Engineering, Skype for Business) also said that the company intends "to extend the platform to complement partner solutions and integrate their monitoring, reporting and analytics capabilities with Skype for Business Online management tools."
He further highlighted the acquisition as "the latest example of Microsoft"s commitment to deliver a complete, enterprise-grade communications solution at global scale with Office 365."