Disruptive Telephony

Earlier this week there was the announcement that Sangoma was acquiring Montreal-based startup Paraxip for $4.8 million which was interesting to me on a couple of levels. First, I've known David Mandelstam from Sangoma for now around 8 years since way back when I was part of the open source startup e-smith up in Ottawa. David and I have continued to meet at trade shows over all these years and he's a great guy. So I'm pleased for him that Sangoma is growing.

It's also an intriguing transaction because it moves Sangoma is a different direction from its past... they have primarily been a provider of PSTN-connection hardware with a heavy focus in recent years on Asterisk and open source. Now, with Paraxip, they move into Windows-based enterprise software! As Jon Arnold points out, the two companies already announced last September the integration of their products, so that part of an acquisition has already been done.

In any event, I'm pleased for them all that this has worked out and I wish them all the best. Here is some good analysis of the deal:

• Garrett Smith: Sangoma Broaden’s Their Horizons With Paraxip Deal
• Jon Arnold: Sangoma Acquires Paraxip - More Canadian Consolidation

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