Business-based social collaboration tool Yammer has agreed to acquisition by Microsoft for $1.2 billion, according to a news report.
Yammer lets organisations offer employees Twitter-like and Facebook-like functionality in a workplace setting. Employees can set up profiles, do microblogging, participate in discussion forums and receive activity stream notifications about what their colleagues are doing.
The Wall Street Journal is reporting cites a “person familiar with the matter” as saying the rumoured deal involving the enterprise social collaboration firm and Microsoft has been closed.
Citing anonymous sources, Bloomberg reported Thursday that Microsoft is in advanced talks to acquire Yammer for about $1 billion. Microsoft and Yammer declined to comment.
The acquisition could help Microsoft beef up the enterprise social features in collaboration products like SharePoint, Exchange, Lync and Office.
Microsoft and other vendors selling collaboration stacks, like IBM and Cisco Systems, have been incorporating enterprise social networking (ESN) functionality into their products. Enterprise application vendors are doing likewise, including Salesforce.com, SAP and Oracle.
Yammer has 5 million corporate users and its clients include over 85 percent of the Fortune 500. It has raised US$142 million in funding since its founding in 2008 and has about 300 employees.
Yammer offers a basic free version of its software, and three fee-based tiers.
