Recent reports suggest Microsoft has signed a letter of intent to acquire Equivio, an Israeli text-analysis vendor.
According to the Wall Street Journal report, published Tuesday, citing sources familiar with the company’s plans, Microsoft is ready to pay $200 million for the Israeli text analysis startup.
The deal has not yet been finalized. Both Microsoft and Equivio declined to comment on the purported deal.
Equivio is famous for its text analysis software that makes use of machine algorithm to group together relevant texts from large amounts of documents, such as e-mails and social networks and analyze legal documents and corporate information for use by law firms, corporations and government agencies.
The company’s website lists the U.S. Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, auditor company KPMG in the Netherlands, Deloitte and “hundreds” of law firms and corporations as its customers. Equivio has a network of more than 80 “e-discovery service providers,” the site says.
The text analysis company has been working with Microsoft technologies, including Windows XP, SQL Server and SharePoint Server, since around 2006.
Founded by Amir Milo, Yiftach Ravid and Warwick Sharp, Equivio is based in Rosh Ha’Ayin, located around 26 kilometers east of Tel Aviv.
