Enterprise, IT management, Content

Accenture Acquires Clarity Insights for Data Analytics, AI, ML Engineering

Accenture is acquiring Clarity Insights, a data science consultancy with artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML) and enterprise automation expertise. Once the deal is finalized, the acquired business will tuck into Accenture's Accenture's Applied Intelligence organization. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Clarity, founded in 2008 and headquarter in Chicago, has nearly 350 employees and a portfolio of accelerators that "can help organizations more quickly realize value from their data" the companies say. Clarity's vertical market expertise includes healthcare, financial services and insurance.

Clarity's revenue grew to $73.9 million in 2016, according to an Inc. 5000 honor in 2017. The company's three-year growth rate at the time was 49 percent. ChannelE2E could not find additional data for the privately held company.

Clarity's next home, the Accenture Applied Intelligence group, employs more than 20,000 professionals, including 6,000 data scientists, data engineers and AI professionals worldwide, the company indicated.

The deal aligns with earlier Accenture acquisitions such as Knowledgent and Kogentix in the United States, Pragsis Bidoop in Spain and Analytics8 in Australia, the company said.

Accenture Acquires Clarity Insights: Executive Insights

Neil Huse, CEO, Clarity Insights
Neil Huse, CEO, Clarity Insights

In a prepared statement, Athina Kanioura, chief analytics officer and global lead for Applied Intelligence at Accenture, said:

“Clarity Insights’s combination of strong technical talent, combined with deep industry expertise, will fortify and broaden our ability to help our clients scale AI across their businesses. Their focus on insight-driven transformation for healthcare bolsters Accenture’s capabilities and is particularly critical now, when our research shows that 87% of healthcare executives surveyed report that they know how to pilot, but struggle to scale AI across their business.”

Added Clarity Insights CEO Neil Huse:

“We were drawn to Accenture, in large part, because of the synergies in how we approach clients. Fully understanding clients’ business goals and objectives is the first step to a successful AI deployment. From there our team can pull together the right data foundation, tools and accelerators that will smooth their path to adoption. With Accenture, we’ll be able to accelerate this shared vision for success and help more clients get there, more quickly.”

The deal is subject to "customary closing conditions, including antitrust clearance," Accenture says.

Accenture Acquisition Strategy

Accenture spent nearly $1.2 billion on 33 acquisitions during the company's 2019 fiscal year, which wrapped up in August 2019. That was a bit below the company's original target of $1.5 billion in buyouts. The acquisition strategy has continued in Accenture's fiscal year 2020 under new CEO Julie Sweet.

The deals typically focus on digital transformation, cloud, cybersecurity and AI, ML and other next-generation technologies. Many of the acquisitions have furthered Accenture's reputation as a Top 200 Public Cloud MSP and a Top 200 MSSP (managed security services provider) in 2019.

Here's ChannelE2E's frequently update list of Accenture acquisitions.

Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri is co-founder & editorial director of MSSP Alert and ChannelE2E, the two leading news & analysis sites for managed service providers in the cybersecurity market.

You can skip this ad in 5 seconds