Five9 Acquires IVA Leader Inference Solutions

After the stock market closed today, Five9 announced the acquisition of intelligent virtual agent (IVA) company Inference Solutions. The purchase price is $172 million, $148 million in cash and $24 million when certain bookings targets are met. Inference brings 550 customers, among them several joint Five9 customers -- including Chick-fil-A and Wyndham Hotels. Inference was founded in 2005, spun out from Telstra Research Labs -- think of it as the Australian version of Bell Labs. Headquartered in San Francisco, the company has additional offices in Austin, TX and Melbourne, Australia.