Microsoft announced today that it has completed its acquisition of Nuance Communications. The all-cash $19.7 billion deal was announced back in April 2021, two years after Microsoft and Nuance already announced a strategic partnership to combine Nuance Dragon Medical with Microsoft’s Azure technologies.

You may know Nuance for its Dragon speech recognition technology, but the company is also deeply invested in healthcare, financial services, telecommunications, and other industries. The AI software maker will now allow Microsoft to help organizations leverage ambient intelligence to accomplish their goals.

“Driven by a shared vision to build outcomes-based AI, Microsoft and Nuance will enable organizations across industries to accelerate their business goals with our security-focused, cloud-based solutions infused with powerful, vertically optimized AI. Customers will benefit from enhanced consumer, patient, clinician and employee experiences, and ultimately improved productivity and financial performance,” Microsoft said in a press release today.

For context, Nuance is the third most expensive acquisition in the history of Microsoft after Activision Blizzard ($68.7 billion) and LinkedIn ($26.2 billion). Now that the company is under Microsoft’s umbrella, its CEO Mark Benjamin will remain at his position and report to report to Scott Guthrie, Executive Vice President, Cloud + AI group at Microsoft, the company said today.

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