Microsoft announced Monday that it has agreed to acquire the product assets from Adxstudio, a longtime partner of its Dynamics business. The deal will give Microsoft access to tools that extend Dynamics to the Web, which the company will integrate directly into its CRM product.
The product that Microsoft bought allows businesses to connect their Dynamics system to a Web portal that can then be used for things like partner relationship management, technical support solutions and more. It’s an important step to make Dynamics more useful right when businesses buy it, rather than require them to work with a partner in order to do the same things.
Dynamics is facing tight competition from a variety of players in the CRM market, including Salesforce, which Microsoft reportedly tried to acquire earlier this year.
Adxstudio’s Web portal technology will be available to Dynamics customers who have the service deployed in an on-premises environment and those who just have a Dynamics CRM Online subscription with Microsoft.
Adxstudio’s Professional Services organization, which handles things like consulting with companies on their CRM deployments, was not included in the deal, and will remain an independent entity. Any customers who have an existing contract with that group will continue getting served, and it will continue taking new clients.
Microsoft has also hired an unspecified number of employees from Adxstudio as part of the deal, including key product engineers and technical staff. They’ll become part of the Dynamics team.
The two firms have a long and fruitful relationship together. Since 2008, Adxstudio has been winning awards from Microsoft in celebration of the partnerships between the two firms.
Monday’s news is one in a long string of acquisitions by the company, including a deal two months ago in which Microsoft picked up longtime partner FieldOne to enhance Dynamics.
(This update replaces last phrase of second sentence in the fifth paragraph with the news that Adxstudio’s Professional Services organization will continue to take new clients.)