After forking out a cool $1.2 billion for the enterprise social network provider Yammer last month, Microsoft now announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire multi-touch display solutions provider Perceptive Pixel Inc. (PPI). The financial terms of this deal were not disclosed.

According to Kurt DelBene, president of the Office Division at Microsoft, this latest acquisition will assist the Redmond-based software giant to accelerate the PC market’s evolution to touch-based input.

DelBene stated that PPI’s large touchscreens, coupled with hardware from Microsoft’s OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) will lead to very capable Windows 8-based PCs and will also create “new possibilities for productivity and collaboration.”

This is because Redmond will utilise PPI’s expertise in both software development and hardware manufacturing within areas such as workgroup collaboration, business meetings and corporate presentations.

PPI’s patented display technologies are employed within a broad spectrum of industries ranging from government and defense, through to engineering and higher education.

“We are incredibly excited to be working together on our mutual passion to build technologies that enable people to collaborate and communicate,” stated Jeff Han, founder of PPI. “By joining Microsoft, we will be able to take advantage of the tremendous momentum of the Microsoft Office Division, tightly interoperate with its products, and deliver this technology to a very broad set of customers.”

In related news, Microsoft recently previewed the forthcoming release of its smartphone platform, Windows Phone 8, and also unveiled two of its own Windows 8-based tablet devices named Surface.