Microsoft to buy Yammer for $1.2 billion -- report

Rick Wilking / Reuters

Microsoft logos are shown at a trade show.

By msnbc.com staff

Business software company Yammer has agreed to sell itself to Microsoft for $1.2 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal.

It?s not clear when the Yammer deal will be completed or announced, the report said.

The deal is a sign that Microsoft may be trying to bolster its popular Office software suite, according to the Journal.

Yammer is an enterprise social network that provides a secure way for employees to communicate and share files.

It is one of a set of new software companies -- including Box, Dropbox, Jive Software and Basecamp -- that are providing workers with new tools to communicate, store and share files at work, or edit them along with their coworkers, the newspaper noted.

The Yammer acquisition follows a handful of similar deals where large, established software companies purchase smaller players who are focused on social media.

For example, in May Oracle acquired Virtue, a cloud-based marketing company, while Buddy Media, another social media marketing platform, was acquired by Salesforce.com in early June.

These new companies are a threat to Microsoft, which pioneered software for the workplace, the Journal said. However, the software also links in to and enhances Microsoft software products, such as Outlook e-mail, the newspaper said.

The Journal also points out that the Yammer deal marks the second time Microsoft has acquired a company that?s about to do an initial public offering.

Last May Microsoft acquired Internet video chat company Skype for $8.5 billion in cash -- the biggest acquisition in Microsoft?s history. Prior to the deal, Skype owners had filed documents to take the company public, the Journal said.

(Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and Comcast?s NBC Universal unit.)

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