Microsoft Makes Teams Voice and Video Calling Features Available to Custom Business Apps

Cloud Computing

Microsoft has announced the general availability of Azure Communication Services (ACS) for Teams. The new service enables developers to integrate Microsoft Teams capabilities within their custom business applications with just a few lines of code.

Microsoft’s Azure Communication Services first launched in public preview back in 2020. The goal of this release was to provide customers and partners with the same audio, video, chat, and screen-sharing features that power Microsoft Teams.

Microsoft highlights that developers can use the integrated services to build apps for various scenarios such as healthcare, call centers, retail, and education-specific apps. It should eliminate the need to switch between business apps and Teams while collaborating with external partners and colleagues.

“With Azure Communication Services, our goal is to continue to help businesses transform their communication experiences to meet the needs of their customers and their employees. More specifically, Azure Communication Services interoperability with Microsoft Teams provides the flexibility and scalability needed to build custom app experiences that connect people to the Teams platform, getting more value out of their communication investments,” the company explained.

Microsoft Makes Teams Voice and Video Calling Features Available to Custom Business Apps

According to Microsoft, this release enables developers to bring calling features into low-end devices that lack native support for the Microsoft Teams desktop client. It also helps to implement workflows that need custom management of Teams phone calls.

Microsoft releases two SDKs for Azure Communication Services

Developers can use Azure Communication Services APIs along with Microsoft Graph API features. This capability makes it possible to add and manage chats, channels, and meetings, as well as server and client-side calling bots. Developers can also use the APIs to collect information about employees to build custom apps for Microsoft Teams.

Microsoft has also announced the release of two software development kits (SDKs) for Azure Communication Services and Teams. The Azure Communication Services Identity SDK allows developers and admins to manage access tokens for Microsoft Teams users. Moreover, the Azure Communication Services Calling SDK for JavaScript lets developers add one-on-one voice and video calling capabilities into custom applications.