Mitel Acquires Inter-Tel

Mitel has announced an agreement to acquire Inter-Tel. Both companies compete in the SMB market for voice over IP, and both have a strong set of solutions.

My guess is that Mitel saw two primary gains with this acquisition, the first is Inter-Tel's large network of service and support offices throughout the U.S., the second is Inter-Tel's strength in the SMB market. Inter-Tel also offers managed services that Mitel can build upon.

Still, there's a great deal of product overlap, so I expect we'll see some sort of shakeout fairly soon after the acquisition is complete.