Yammer is a well known successful digital company that offers businesses a chance to have private social networks of their own. This allows everyone inside a given company to have better communication, faster response from employees and ease of access to updated data of their interest. It surely sounds like a potential Internet leader and, not surprisingly, has drawn Microsoft's attention, which has decided to acquire it for a whopping $1.2 billion.

Microsoft formally announced on Monday about Yammer's acquisition. As its first move, the software giant will add a cloud-based component to the already-working private social-networking system, which will make it clear to all users about the new owner of Yammer.

David Sacks is Yammer's founder and he introduced the social network in 2008. Sacks' experience as a co-founder of PayPal gave him the required knowledge to know businesses' needs and interests. In fact, Sacks didn't plan on selling Yammer but the only reason he accepted the offer is because he strongly believes that Microsoft's support will accelerate the development of the system.

Microsoft showed notable interest in the many benefits it could get from Yammer and its potential. In fact, Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO, suggested that Yammer could fill the gap left by SharePoint and Dynamics CRM, which have been both criticized.

So the reason why Microsoft made such an investment is clear and notable. The fact that Yammer has many Facebook and Twitter-like features makes it even more commercial and attractive to consumers, especially because these social networks are dominating the Internet world today.

Meanwhile, the rivals of Yammer, including Jive Software, NewsGator, Socialtext and Tibbr, which were breathing down its neck, will be forced to back off now as it has secured Microsoft's management and support.

However, Microsoft said it will let Yammer operate independently because it strongly believes that Yammer's success lies intimately on its style and methodology.

This is good news for the 5 million-odd users of Yammer, who can expect to enjoy the new features coming in the next few months to the social network.