Microsoft closes on $16 billion acquisition of Nuance

By MICHELLE CHAPMAN
AP Business Writer

Microsoft has closed on its approximately $16 billion acquisition of speech recognition company Nuance. The deal, which was announced last year, helps Microsoft Corp. get more entrenched into hospitals and the health care industry through Nuance’s widely used medical dictation and transcription tools. Mark Benjamin will continue to serve as CEO of Nuance and report to Microsoft’s head of cloud computing and artificial intelligence. The acquisition is Microsoft’s second-largest after its $26 billion purchase of career networking service LinkedIn in 2016 but could soon be eclipsed by Microsoft’s planned purchase of video game company Activision Blizzard.