[VoiceOps] Alianza Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire Metaswitch from Microsoft

[Ryan Delgrosso]

I'm not convinced that's the salient question since it would seem this 
is just an exercise in buying cloud revenue and little if any of the 
original Metaswitch dna have or will survive.

To be fair that dna in 2024 terms is of dubious value anyway.

My bet is they will probably bring in some talent (think just barely 
enough) to try and collect the long-tail of revenue on existing 
installed base meanwhile pushing stick/carrot to move into their own 
cloud platforms.

On 12/11/2024 10:48 AM, Jeff Brower wrote:
>
> Ryan if this is accurate, I wonder how many ex-Metaswitchers will end 
> up at Alianza. Or maybe some already are ?
>
> Quoting Ryan Delgrosso via VoiceOps <voiceops at voiceops.org>:
>
>> I would not place any bets on there being a holistic end state 
>> worldview attached to this acquisition vs it just being a metabolic 
>> process.
>>
>> Microsoft had a hole in their Teams / SFB product. The telco side 
>> sucked.
>>
>> They thought they could buy a telco vendor and fill that hole. The 
>> driving exec team would get to place a feather in their caps and 
>> claim they drew the proverbial sword from the stone and should each 
>> be granted their own kingdoms.
>>
>> The Metaswitch ownership got to take delivery of gold plated 
>> dumptrucks full of cash.
>>
>> Once the ink was dry a culture war ensued. Metaswitch wanted to 
>> continue sucking in their own entirely British/telco way where the 
>> end user carrier should not be permitted to do almost anything. 
>> Microsoft insisted they begin sucking in entirely new cloud/azurian 
>> ways. In response nearly all meta employees have exited, so there's 
>> now a disenfranchised customer base of orphaned carriers and no 
>> supporting brainpower, meanwhile all customers have felt the sword of 
>> Damocles over them the whole time never sure if their business would 
>> have a path forward. Many have already made other plans for product 
>> continuity by switching to other vendors or outsourcing their tech 
>> entirely.
>>
>> The purges I believe concluded last year with most of the original 
>> meta team members being released save for a very select few who were 
>> offered roles inside the teams / azure org.
>>
>> I think this sale is Microsoft selling the proverbial owl-pellet of 
>> what remains of its Metaswitch acquisition. I'm not sure what actual 
>> value Microsoft actually derived from this exercise but I am sure 
>> this move represents the final step of digestion where some 
>> loss/depreciation is written off in FY24
>>
>> -Ryan
>>
>> On 12/11/2024 9:51 AM, Alex Balashov via VoiceOps wrote:
>>>> On Dec 11, 2024, at 12:46 pm, Enzo Damato via VoiceOps 
>>>> <voiceops at voiceops.org> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> I think Microsoft's big goal with this was to acquire a working, 
>>>> reliable SIP and IMS stack. I would put money on the metaswtich 
>>>> technology being a big part of what's running teams and their other 
>>>> VoIP platforms in the backed. Now that they've presumably merged 
>>>> that tech into their stack, they have no interest in continuing to 
>>>> service the ILEC/CLEC market.
>>> You might be right. But if they had just licensed this from a major 
>>> softswitch vendor like Metaswitch, or got the professional services 
>>> / consulting arm of Metaswitch (or whoever) to do the integration 
>>> for them, they might have spent a lot less than $270MM and without 
>>> any of the drama.
>>>
>>> -- Alex
>>>
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>
>
>