Microsoft to buy corporate group chat company

Microsoft announced on Wednesday plans to acquire Parlano, a developer of group chat applications for large corporate customers. The software giant plans to add Chicago-based Parlano's MindAlign group chat functionality as a new feature to several of its products, such as Microsoft Office Communications Server, Microsoft Office Communicator and its instant messaging and VoIP software.

Parlano's technology allows employees, customers, partners and others to chime in on a particular topic via instant messaging, as well as search for past "conversations" on a particular type of topic from previous instant messaging discussions. Terms of the detail were not disclosed. Microsoft expects to close the acquisition during the fourth quarter.