With the announcement earlier this week of the Microsoft Speech Server, the software and IT giant is poised to make big waves in the telecommunications market according to Info-Tech Research. Microsoft has been making serious moves into the market over the last year with a series of communications-related releases, including the Live Communications Server (LCS) 2005, the Office Communicator 2005 integrated Voice over IP (VoIP) and instant messaging (IM) client, and the SharePoint Portal Server. The company has also pursued a strategy of partnerships and alliances with leading telecommunications equipment vendors like Alcatel and Siemens.

According to Info-Tech senior analyst Carmi Levy, Microsoft is in the process of tying all of its multimedia technologies together in a strategy to dominate the VoIP market. He notes, moreover, that there are few companies better suited to do just this.

"Microsoft is tying together all of its multimedia-capable messaging assets into a cohesive strategy to penetrate and dominate the burgeoning VoIP market," Levy said in a statement. "Microsoft clearly understands the need to establish itself at strategic points in the VoIP market in order to succeed on a worthwhile scale."