Ahead of the upcoming launch of its first iPhone keyboard app, Microsoft has brought one of the biggest players in the market.
More than 300 million people across the globe use the third-party keyboard on Android and iOS.
SwiftKey supports more than 100 languages, is incorporated into many apps as the default keyboard, and is pre-installed on many smartphones as the default typing tool.
Microsoft's £174million deal might sound like a lot, although investors have said the price is a little lower than they would have expected even a few year earlier.
SwiftKey was set up in 2008 by Cambridge graduates Jon Reynolds and Dr Ben Medlock.
The company has also worked with Cambridge-based Professor Stephen Hawking, helping the scientist and author to upgrade his communications, applying predictive language software to his system and enabling him to speak faster and continue to give lectures.
Mr Reynolds and Dr Medlock said in a statement: "We're excited to announce an important milestone on SwiftKey's journey. As of today, we have agreed to join the Microsoft family."
Microsoft's executive vice president of technology and research, Harry Shum, said of the deal: "We love SwiftKey's technology and we love the team that Jon and Ben have formed.
"That's why today I'm excited to welcome the company's employees to Microsoft. We believe that together we can achieve orders of magnitude greater scale than either of us could have achieved independently."
Dr Medlock studied computer speech and sciences at Cambridge and the pair used his knowledge of natural language patterns and artificial intelligence to create the SwiftKey system, which predicts what a user is typing based on their previous writing habits - finishing words for them so they can write faster.
It started as a side project as both men worked full-time elsewhere following their graduation, with Mr Reynolds in the Civil Service, working on the sale of the High Speed 1 Channel Tunnel rail line.
After founding the company, the pair's first SwiftKey app launched on the Android platform in 2010, supporting seven languages, and quickly took off. It has since been downloaded from the Google Play Store more than 10 million times, and has topped the download rankings in 47 countries.
The app was described as a "revolution" in typing and communication, being named Best Startup Business at the 2012 Guardian Innovation Awards, and coming third in the Sunday Times Hiscox Tech Track 100 - a list of Britain's best private technology companies - in 2014.
Today the app supports more than 100 languages, has been incorporated into many apps as the default keyboard, and is pre-installed on many smartphones as the default typing tool.
Offices have been opened in San Francisco and Seoul, South Korea, alongside the headquarters in Southwark, south London, with the company now employing more than 160 staff.
In 2014 the app was launched on the iPhone, and it was downloaded more than a million times in the US alone in its first time on the iOS App Store.
Source: Express UK
