Nuance acquires text input developer Swype for $102.5M

Speech recognition technology provider Nuance Communications agreed to acquire mobile text input solutions firm Swype for $102.5 million. A Securities and Exchange Commission filing states Nuance paid $77.5 million at closing and will fork over the remaining $25 million 18 months from now.

Swype (a Fierce 15 winner in 2010) leverages smartphone touchscreen technology to enable subscribers to type text messages and search queries by dragging their finger from key to key, translating to a faster, more intuitive user experience. The Swype technology was developed by Cliff Kushler, who previously pioneered the T9 text input system while at Tegic Communications--in 2007, Nuance acquired Tegic from AOL for $265 million.

This summer, Swype stated its solution is now installed across more than 50 million Android devices. Around the same time, Swype raised an additional $2.5 million in Series C financing led by existing investors including Samsung Ventures, Nokia Growth Partners, Benaroya Capital, DoCoMo Capital and Ignition Partners--in all, the firm has raised about $14 million.

Nuance's Dragon speech recognition software powers search and dictation services spanning Google's (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android, Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) iOS and Research In Motion's (NASDAQ:RIMM) BlackBerry. Its software is reportedly included in Siri, the new voice-activated control technology integrated into Apple's forthcoming iPhone 4S, announced earlier this week.

For more:
- read this SEC filing

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