Microsoft has acquired text analysis startup Equivio for an undisclosed amount.
Announcing the deal, Microsoft Corporate Vice President Rajesh Jha, in a blog post, said “We are making this acquisition to help our customers tackle the legal and compliance challenges inherent in managing large quantities of email and documents.”
Founded in 2004, the Israel-based Equivio develops text analysis software, which analyses, sorts data and groups related documents and emails together. The software allows governments, corporations and big organizations to sift through massive troves of data for the purposes of responding to legal or compliance matters. The US Department of Justice, NASA, Thomson Reuters, and Deloitte are among some of Equivio’s current customers.
Microsoft has acknowledged that it will use the text analytic startup’s technology to bolster the data-analysis capability of Office 365.
“Office 365 includes robust eDiscovery and information governance capabilities today, and we’ll use Equivio’s machine learning technology to make these vital tools even more intelligent and easy to use in the months ahead,” Jha explained in the blog post.
It is reported that as part of the acquisition “a significant number” of Equivio’s current employees will join the Redmond and work at the company’s offices in Israel, including the Microsoft Israel Research and Development Center.
All though the companies did not reveal the financial terms of the deal, it is expected that the acquisition would have cost Microsoft near about $US200 million.
