GAITHERSBURG, Md. and REDMOND, Wash., Oct. 7 /PRNewswire/ -- Today BroadSoft Inc., a leading provider of voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) application software, and Microsoft Corp. announced the general availability of a hosted unified communications service for business from BroadSoft, based on Microsoft software.

By providing the advantages of hosted software plus services, BroadSoft and Microsoft enable businesses of all sizes to decrease infrastructure costs, improve productivity, and enhance communications integrated with their applications and processes. Unified communications integrates communication options such as instant messaging, e-mail, phone and video. It also enhances business processes by integrating communications features with business process software, including customer relationship management, accounting and enterprise resource planning.

"Our combined hosted unified communications solution is moving the market to a new era where voice, data and video are seamlessly integrated, which allows service providers to bring to market next-generation communication services to their customers," said Michael Tessler, CEO and president of BroadSoft. "This solution also delivers productivity benefits for small and medium-sized businesses and large businesses by integrating telephony and desktop applications without the carrying costs of premise equipment and support."

Built on the Microsoft Solution for Hosted Messaging and Collaboration (HMC) version 4.5 and integrated with BroadSoft's BroadWorks business telephony platform, the unified communications offering helps improve the efficiency of how employees communicate, increasing productivity across all functional areas.

"Today's announcement with BroadSoft is another step in Microsoft's software plus services strategy to provide customers with the power of choice for their cloud computing initiatives," said Alex Danyluk, industry director, global telecom business for the Communications Sector at Microsoft. "With a hosted solution, service providers have the opportunity to offer small and medium-sized businesses powerful productivity tools often only available to larger corporations."

About BroadSoft(R)

BroadSoft provides VoIP application software that enables the delivery of hosted telephony and multimedia services. Its award-winning flagship BroadWorks(R) technology empowers wireless, wireline and cable carriers to deliver next-generation voice and multimedia applications and advanced features that enable them to increase revenue, enhance competitive differentiation and elevate customer satisfaction. BroadSoft's family of carrier-class software products delivers the scale, open architecture and reliability that the world's leading telecommunications companies demand to serve mission-critical enterprise and residential broadband customers. BroadSoft provides VoIP applications to seven of the top 10 and 13 of the top 25 largest carriers worldwide, as measured by recent annual revenue, including Korea Telecom, KPN, SingTel, Sprint, Telefonica de Espana, Telstra, T-Systems, and Verizon. For additional information, go to www.BroadSoft.com .

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

SOURCE BroadSoft Inc.