Microsoft buys keyboard software maker SwiftKey

The company is eyeing at taking over SwiftKey for $250 million, which means that Jon Reynolds and Ben Medlock, the co-founders of SwiftKey, will get $30 million each.

That part is true, as Microsoft does plan to integrate the SwiftKey software with its own, but the company underlines that it has no plans of leaving Android and iOS SwiftKey users out in the cold.

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Eight-year-old SwiftKey is known among Android users as a replacement keyboard app for phones and tablets. Swiftkey has more than 150 employees in London, San Francisco and Seoul.

Artificial intelligence is now an important focus of research and development in technology, but also beyond. Presumably it’s that technology and research capability that Microsoft wants to deploy, more so than having access to the relatively modest income earned by the Swiftkey app.

One of the attractions of SwiftKey is that it uses artificial intelligence techniques to speed users’ typing. Those networks are modeled after the workings of the human brain, allowing for better predictive ability.

In some ways, Microsoft’s move is surprising, as it already has its own software keyboard, Word Flow, and last month announced that it would release versions of Word Flow for Android and iOS, where SwiftKey is already available. This has been their strategy for quite a long time as the Microsoft branding has now found its way into the PS 4 devices with their acquisition of Minecraft, and into Android and iOS devices with a plethora of apps being launched regarding the same.

The app is now featured on over 300 million devices and is integrated into a number of smartphones including Samsung and OnePlus devices. Swiftkey went free for Android previous year which sent a smile across all Android users, owing to the fact that Swiftkey introduced a bunch of innovative features for mobile keyboard.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has made no secret of his desire to gain ground in the mobile sector by buying well-known productivity apps.

Microsoft has acquired many startups and small apps in recent times, such as Wunderlist, Acompli, Sunrise, among many others.