Elly Yates-Roberts |
Microsoft has completed its acquisition of ambient and artificial intelligence (AI) specialist Nuance Communications, helping organisations in healthcare and other industries to provide better and more personalised patient and customer experiences.
According to Microsoft, the acquisition will help customers to improve productivity, enhance financial performance, and reach business goals using cloud-based solutions and industry-specific AI.
“Completion of this significant and strategic acquisition brings together Nuance’s best-in-class conversational AI and ambient intelligence with Microsoft’s secure and trusted industry cloud offerings,” said Scott Guthrie, executive vice president of cloud and AI at Microsoft. “This powerful combination will help providers offer more affordable, effective and accessible healthcare, and help organisations in every industry create more personalised and meaningful customer experiences. I couldn’t be more pleased to welcome the Nuance team to our Microsoft family.”
Together, Microsoft and Nuance aim to use cloud-based AI solutions to help healthcare providers to reduce clinician burnout and improve the likelihood of early detection of disease. In addition, the solutions will help businesses in the financial services, retail and telecommunications sectors to boost employee well-being and productivity.
“Combining the power of Nuance’s deep vertical expertise and proven business outcomes across healthcare, financial services, retail, telecommunications and other industries with Microsoft’s global cloud ecosystems will enable us to accelerate our innovation and deploy our solutions more quickly, more seamlessly and at greater scale to solve our customers’ most pressing challenges,” said Mark Benjamin, CEO of Nuance. “As Microsoft and Nuance come together as one organisation, we are excited about the opportunities ahead for our technology, employees, customers and partners.”