Cisco Takes Aim At Microsoft With Acquisition Of MindMeld

Cisco's acquisition of artificial intelligence and machine learning startup MindMeld is a direct shot at unified communications and collaboration (UC&C) rival Microsoft, according to partners. "What Cisco is doing is directly going after Microsoft that is integrating all different pieces of software that we collaborate with in real time and have access to data in real time," said Jamie Shepard, senior vice president for health care and strategy at Lumenate, a Dallas-based solution provider and Cisco partner. "Microsoft is getting very much into AI and machine learning and analytics and things of that nature – they're trying to compete with the Googles and Amazons right now … Microsoft is a good model to emulate here and that's kind of what Cisco's doing." Cisco and Microsoft have been battling it out for years for leadership in the UC&C market. The San Jose, Calif.-based networking giant has been edging further ahead of Microsoft for market supremacy, owning 15 percent of the total UC&C market, compared to 12.5 percent from Microsoft, according to fourth quarter 2016 data from research firm Synergy Research Group.