Avaya Buys Esna For Collaboration and Communications Technology

Unified communications provider Avaya said it has bought Esna Technologies, a 25-year old Redmond Hill, Ontario, Canada-based provider of cloud-based unified communications.

Neither company disclosed terms of the deal. Avaya said it will assume Esna’s assets, intellectual property, technology partnerships, alliances, employees and access to channel partners. Esna will operate as a wholly-owned Avaya subsidiary, officials said.

The move maps to Avaya’s repositioning as a provider of mobile and cloud-centric collaboration solutions. Avaya said the acquisition will enable enterprise and midmarket users to more readily adopt communications-enabled applications–accessing voice, video, IM/presence, conferencing and messaging capabilities from within cloud-based business applications using any device. 

“Avaya has a long-held belief in the value of communications-enabling business applications,” wrote Gary Barnett, Avaya Engagement Solutions senior vice president and general manager, in a blog post.

“The acquisition of Esna accelerates the true integration of communications into business applications and provides an easy user experience from within the applications people use on the device du jour,” he said.

Esna has been a member of Avaya’s DevConnect Select Product Program for a number of years, according to Barnett. Its iLink technology enables users to embed a link to a Avaya Scopia video conferencing virtual meeting in an Outlook meeting notice.

“Esna and Avaya are building the future of collaboration experience, a future where communication is embedded directly into the applications, processes and workflows that drive how work gets done,” said Mohammad Nezarati, Esna chief executive.

Avaya said an Esna-enabled Avaya Communicator web client will be available for both the Avaya IP Office and Avaya Aura platforms with out-of-the-box video and voice capabilities that can be embedded into public or private cloud-based business applications.

“For all the effort that the industry has invested in business communications, most offers fall woefully short of the seamless user experience that leads to effortless engagement,” Barnett said. “It’s time for the convergence of communications and business applications, time for enabling communications from the browsers of public or private cloud-based applications people use every day, and time for the user experience to be one click to engage,” he said.