Microsoft acquires Peer5 to supplement Teams' live video streaming
Microsoft has acquired Peer5, a WebRTC-based electronic content-delivery-network (eCDN) vendor, for an undisclosed amount. Microsoft announced the Peer5 purchase on August 10.
Peer5's technology will be used to enhance live video streaming in Microsoft Teams, Microsoft officials said. Peer5's current product runs in browsers to optimize bandwidth usage for line-of-business applications, Microsoft officials said, and its mesh networks can automatically scale as the number of viewers increases. Peer5's technology doesn't require additional installation on user endpoints or any changes to physical network infrastructure, officials added.
While the addition of the Peer5 solution will give Microsoft its own, first-party product in this space, Microsoft will continue to support other eCDN solutions from Microsoft certified partners, officials said. Current Peer5 customers will be able to continue using their existing Peer5 services, they said.
Peer5 has been touting its "seamless integration" with Microsoft's Teams, Stream and Yammer products on its site. It also has offered legacy support for IE and live and video-on-demand support for Office 365.
Peer5, founded in 2012, has offices in Palo Alto, Calif. and Tel Aviv. According to its web site, the company's staff has experience in big-data analytics, virtualization and networking. The company is active in the WebRTC space and a member of the W3C steering committee.