Accenture Acquires AI, Big Data Software Development Firm Sentelis -

Accenture has announced the latest in its long line of acquisitions. This time, the multinational professional services company has acquired Sentelis, an independent data consulting and engineering company from France.

This is M&A deal number 248 that ChannelE2E has covered so far in 2020. See the complete M&A deal list here.

Sentelis specializes in designing and scaling data and artificial intelligence capabilities. Founded in 2011, Sentelis has over 50 employees, including AI advisors, architects, and engineers. The company has worked with some of the largest French companies to help them accelerate business innovation, Accenture said.

Accenture sees Sentelis’s industry experience, particularly in financial services and retail, as a complement to its own expertise in global large-scale AI and machine learning engineering initiatives. The acquired business will tuck into Accenture's Applied Intelligence division.

Accenture Acquires Sentelis: Executives Perspectives

Olivier Girard, country managing director of Accenture in France and Benelux — Olivier Girard of Accenture in France and Benelux

In a prepared statement about the deal, Olivier Girard, market unit lead, Accenture France and Benelux, said:

“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. In addition to organically growing talent, Accenture’s strategic approach to acquisitions is designed to ensure the right capabilities are in place to meet existing, as well as emerging client needs with speed and scale. Together, we would be able to help a broader range of clients industrialize innovation in data strategy and AI.”

Athina Kanioura, chief analytics officer and global lead for Accenture Applied Intelligence, added:

“Our research shows that a strong data foundation underpins an organization’s ability to successfully scale AI. Strategic acquisitions — like Sentelis — are bringing greater capacity and enhanced capabilities to our data and AI client work. Sentelis’s data strategy, architecture and engineering skills align seamlessly with Accenture’s focus on industrialized, end-to-end solutions. With the addition of Sentelis, we would see even greater opportunity to accelerate how our clients gain value from data and AI across their business.”

Sentelis Director Isabelle Regnier along with President Jean-Baptiste Ceccaldi together concluded:

“Today, smart businesses are adopting and pursuing digital transformation to balance innovation and industrialization at scale, and to allow their organizations to be seamlessly integrated with the wider ecosystem. To create an intelligent enterprise, it must be built around a mix of digital platforms, with data and AI at its core. This is why, in today’s growing data-driven market, joining Accenture would be a unique opportunity to enlarge our approach to new sectors and help more organizations to leverage their information systems to accelerate their digital transformations.”

Accenture’s Acquisition History

Accenture has made multiple AI and analytics acquisitions lately. Additional example deals involve Analytics8 in Australia, Pragsis Bidoop in Spain, Clarity Insights in North America, Mudano in the UK and Byte Prophecy in India.

Of course, those are only a drop in the bucket of Accenture’s acquisitions. A comprehensive list can be found here.