5 Acquisitions That Accenture’s Made During The Coronavirus Pandemic

Even as global markets have been roiled by the coronavirus pandemic, Accenture has been busy gobbling up companies to expand its market reach and scale with a big focus on industrial customers.

Stronger Every Day

Accenture CEO Julie Sweet was unabashedly optimistic on March 19 when she said the company would only be moderately affected by lockdowns as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, and it would likely emerge stronger when travel restrictions began to subside.

“Our services are highly relevant to our clients. Our rotation to the new over the last several years, our deep clients’ relationships with the world’s leading companies and our unique business model will enable us to help our clients succeed in this uncertain period and continue to position us strongly for the long-term,” she told investors during the earnings call.

The company – known for its outsized appetite for boutique tech companies and larger – has stayed true to Sweet’s prediction and has not slowed down on the acquisition front, having announced plans to buy, or outright purchased, five companies in the last two months.

Two of the five planned buys are focused on creating stronger offerings, in terms of IoT, systems, and processing for the manufacturing and industrial clients at Accenture Industry X.0., while another is focused on cloud. The only planned acquisition of a U.S. company is in cybersecurity, while the rest are in Europe or Canada.

Sentelis

Sentelis, a French company that promises to give “superpowers” to its customers information and use their data as a “lever for business innovation,” is the latest shop that Accenture said it is acquiring.

Sentelis focuses on creating efficient processes based on data insights and relies on AI and robotic process automation to improve business outcomes for its customers.

“The addition of the strong technical talent of Sentelis’s teams, combined with our AI and big data solutions, and deep industry expertise, would be a major opportunity to strengthen and broaden our ability to help clients scale AI across their businesses,” Olivier Girard, market unit lead, Accenture France and Benelux said in a statement.

The company has grown to roughly 50 employees -- including data and AI advisors, architects and engineers -- since its founding in 2011. Its customers include some of the largest French companies in finance and retail.

The acquisition requires prior consultation with the relevant works councils and would be subject to customary closing conditions. Financial terms of the transaction are not being disclosed.

PLM Systems

Accenture bought the Turin, Italy-based PLM Systems to get a European toehold in the high-growth area of product lifecycle management systems. PLM boasts international automotive, industrial equipment, fashion and aerospace and defense companies among its clients managing their products from “inception to disposal.”

“Digital technologies like artificial intelligence are taking product lifecycle management to a new level. This offers industrial companies a huge opportunity to transform a core business function – engineering”, said Nigel Stacey, managing director and global lead of Accenture Industry X.0. “PLM Systems’ expertise and experience in product lifecycle management will allow us to help clients make the best use of their product data.”

PLM Systems – which was founded in 1996 -- is expected to be folded into Accenture Industry X.0 the part of the company that uses digital technologies to inside industrial companies to design, engineer and manufacture products.

“We’re excited to become part of Accenture,” said Alberto Codrino, CEO of PLM Systems. “Its client base and global footprint will offer our team new opportunities to expand their skills and we can develop even better technology solutions for clients to innovate and manage new products”.

Callisto Integration

Accenture Industry X.0 is living up to its motto “combine and conquer” with a combination in the manufacturing space, this one a Canadian company with roots in technology and consulting.

Callisto Integration works with customers in the food and beverage, chemicals, utility industries, providing IoT solutions as well as shop-floor control systems in North America creating real-time data on production processes.

"Our clients, who include the leaders in virtually every industry, are under tremendous pressure to harness the power of disruption for competitive advantage," Jimmy Etheredge, CEO, North America at Accenture said in a statement. "Our acquisition of Callisto shows how we continue to scale our digital manufacturing capabilities to help our clients innovate and succeed in an environment of accelerating digitization."

The Oakville, Ontatio-based Callisto has 160 employees in five global offices including two in the U.S., the U.K. and the Netherlands. The acquisition includes Callisto's MeasureTek subsidiary, based in Albany, which Accenture said uses IoT technology to provide precision farming services, such as dynamic field monitoring and irrigation information.

Mike Grasley, Callisto Integration's chief innovation officer, said, "Becoming part of Accenture Industry X.0 and Accenture's global organization is an incredible opportunity. It allows us to bring our digital manufacturing solutions to more clients at a scale that hasn't been possible before and presents new opportunities to our people."

Gekko

Accenture agreed to buy one of the leading AWS cloud service companies on April 20, when it announced that it planned to take over Gekko.

The Levallois-Perret, France-based company has helped more than 80 clients “design, deploy and maintain a flexible, connected and secure cloud infrastructure” Accenture said.

Gekko is an AWS Advanced Partner, holds an AWS competency in Storage and is an AWS Authorized Training partner. Gekko is also part of the AWS Solution Provider and Well Architected Framework program.

“Aligned with our development strategy, the acquisition of Gekko would be another significant addition because it would give clients more support for public cloud options. Gekko would also be a major opportunity to accelerate our growth strategy in France,” Olivier Girard, Accenture’s Geographic Unit managing director for France and Benelux said in a statement . “ Accenture’s advantage is our ability to keep pace with evolving customer expectations. Our clients call on Accenture to help them innovate and transform their business. Gekko would bring key cloud, AI and DevOps skills and would help us serve a greater and more diverse range of clients in France and the broader European market.”

Gekko’s 100 cloud professionals with more than 85 AWS certifications will be folded in to Accenture’s massive AWS consulting business, the Accenture AWS Business Group, which has more than 8,000 employees and 5,500 certifications worldwide.The Gekko component will focus on France, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

Revolutionary Security

The well-worn phrase ‘you can never have too much cybersecurity’ is true even among the largest solution providers as Accenture showed in April when it bought enterprise-class security provider Revolutionary Security for undisclosed terms.

Based outside of Philadelphia, Revolutionary Security offers breach and attack simulation testing services under the brand LiveFire, which uses real-world threats to find the holes where criminals sneak in. It works with customers in energy, manufacturing, healthcare, financial services and communications.

“The acquisition of Revolutionary Security is another demonstration of our continued commitment to invest in areas to keep our clients safe from cyber threats,” Kelly Bissell, who leads Accenture Security globally said in a statement. “Revolutionary Security’s service offerings are a perfect complement to Accenture’s portfolio, and the acquisition furthers our mission of helping clients better protect and defend their organizations across their entire ecosystem.”

It’s the latest security focused buy for Accenutre. In March, the company agreed to acquire Context Information Security. In recent years it has also bought Symantec’s Cyber Security Services, iDefense, Maglan, Redcore, Arismore and FusionX.