Reuters Zoom Video Communications Inc announced a 14.7 billion allstock deal to buy cloudbased call center operator Five9 Inc in its largestever acquisition, as competition intensifies in its core videoconferencing sector.

The teleconferencing services provider has become a household name and investor favorite in the year since the coronavirus pandemic, as businesses and schools adopted its services to hold virtual classes, office meets and socialise.

The San Jose, Californiabased company is now shifting focus to its twoyearold cloudcalling product Zoom Phone and conferencehosting product Zoom Rooms as bigger players Facebook and Alphabets Google amp up their video products.

The acquisition is expected to help enhance Zooms presence with enterprise customers and allow it to accelerate its longterm growth opportunity by adding the 24billion contact center market, Zoom said in a statement on Sunday.

The acquisition will complement Zoom Phone service, an alternative to legacy phone offerings, by adding Five9s business customers and combining its contact centre software to optimize customer interactions across channels, it added.

Five9s customers include Under Armour, Lululemon Athletica Inc and Olympus Corp, according to its website.

Five9 will become an operating unit of Zoom and its chief executive, Rowan Trollope, will become a president of the company, staying on as chief of the unit after the deal, which is expected to close in the first half of 2022, it said….