This article was published on January 28, 2015

Slack acquires Screenhero to add screen sharing, voice and video


Slack acquires Screenhero to add screen sharing, voice and video

Slack, the increasingly popular communication platform, has made its second acquisition, snapping up collaborative screen sharing service Screenhero for an undisclosed amount in a cash and stock deal.

Screenhero’s entire six-person team is joining Slack, which will integrate its features including screen sharing and voice. The collaboration will also see Slack rolling out new video communication features.

Screenhero is a graduate of Y Combinator. It launched in 2013 and raised a $2.6 million seed round last year from True Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz and Elad Gil, among others.

The screen sharing service will be phased out as a standalone product but current users will continue to have access during the transition to Slack. New user signups are also closed but Slack customers can try the service out using their existing accounts.

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Screenhero’s current app is cross-platform, allowing HD screen sharing on Mac and Windows with supports for multiple cursors and voice chat.

Slack’s CEO, Stewart Butterfield, tells TNW that the deal has been in the works for some time. He says:

“Screenhero is definitely the best screen sharing in the world. I invited J [Sherwani, Screenhero’s CEO] out for a drink last July and the very first thing I said to him was that I wanted to buy Screenhero. It took me a good solid six months of romancing him before he was interested.”

Sherwani will now serve as Slack’s Director of Realtime Communication Products, which suggests we’ll see an even larger range of new features being rolled out by the company soon.

Sherwani says of the deal: “What really helped to seal it was that we were already big Slack users ourselves and it just made sense for us once we saw where things were headed.”

Butterfield wasn’t willing to say how long it will take to fold Screenhero’s features into Slack, but said it will take at least a month for integrations to start appearing.

Precisely what features will be available to users on Slack’s free plan hasn’t been decided yet though Butterfield says one-to-one voice and video chats are likely to be included at that level.

Slack’s first acquisition was Spaces, a tool that allowed people to collaborate on documents remotely, in September last year. Its features are also being integrated into Slack’s main app.

Screenhero

Read next: Slack’s Stewart Butterfield Doesn’t Fear Facebook At Work

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