Mergers and Acquisitions, Mergers and Acquisitions, Content

PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Acquires AWS, Microsoft Azure Cloud Consulting Firms

LONDON, ENGLAND – MARCH 31: A general view of the exterior of the PWC London offices on March 31, 2021 in London, England. PwC told its UK consultants and accounts that they could expect to work two or three days in the office, observe flexible working hours, and quit early on Fridays this summer, as the company announced longer-term working ...

LONDON, ENGLAND – MARCH 31: A general view of the exterior of the PWC London offices on March 31, 2021 in London, England. PwC told its UK consultants and accounts that they could expect to work two or three days in the office, observe flexible working hours, and quit early on Fridays this summer, as the company announced longer-term working arrangements after the Covid-19 pandemic. (Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images)

PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has acquired two cloud consulting firms that specialize in Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure. Financial terms of the deals were not disclosed.

The first deal involves PwC Middle East making a strategic investment in Zero&One. The second deal involved PwC US buying Applications Consulting Training Solutions (ACTS).

These are technology M&A deal number 589 and 590 that ChannelE2E has covered so far in 2022.

PwC Makes a Pair of Cloud Consulting Acquisitions

PwC, based in London, was founded in 1998 through the merger of Coopers & Lybrand. The company has 277,846 employees listed on LinkedIn. PwC’s areas of expertise include assurance, tax and advisory services, IT consulting, cybersecurity and managed security services.

PwC's latest acquisitions involve:

  • Zero&One, founded in 2017, is based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates with an additional location in Beirut, Lebanon. The company has 41 employees listed on LinkedIn. Zero&One’s areas of expertise include cloud, AWS, big data, blockchain, cloud migration, disaster recovery, backup, development, IaaS, SaaS, machine learning, artificial intelligence, high availability, fault-tolerance, government cloud, smart city and IoT.
  • ACTS has 152 employees and is based in Jacksonville, Florida. ACTS areas of expertise include cloud, Microsoft Azure, cloud engineering and technology solutions. The acquisition of ACTS will extend the reach of PwC's cloud experience in financial services and accelerate cross-industry modernization of Microsoft cloud services, the companies said.

PwC Acquisitions: Executive Perspectives

Ali Hosseini, chief digital officer, partner, PwC
Ali Hosseini, chief digital officer, partner, PwC

Ali Hosseini, chief digital officer and partner, PwC Middle East, commented on the Zero&One investment:

“The investment in Zero&One grows our cloud capability and existing proposition at a time where AWS has committed to opening a number of AWS data centers in the UAE. Investing in Zero&One, the first and only local AWS Premier Partner in the Middle East, gives us end-to-end cloud transformation capability, from strategy to execution. With bilingual capabilities and a presence in the UAE and Lebanon, we’re confident that this investment further enables PwC to serve clients better in the region and explore new opportunities around cloud migration, modernization and cloud-native services.”

Ali El Kontar, president, Zero&One commented:

“We are excited and humbled to have PwC on board with us, especially given the exceedingly popular and in demand attitudes around the services we offer, from cloud migrations to application modernization, DevOps, Analytics and much more, in addition to our mutual focus on being people-driven businesses. We are confident this investment will enable us to give even more to our customers, while taking this opportunity to expand in the region and scale to support digital adoption that is growing exponentially."

Matt Hobbs, digital practice leader, PwC
James Farhat, CEO and founder, ACTS

Matt Hobbs, PwC U.S. Microsoft practice leader, commented on the ACTS acquisition:

“We believe in the power of the cloud to unlock innovation and value — and deliver sustained business outcomes. Industry-specific solutions are an important part of PwC’s cloud services strategy, which is why we are so excited to work with James Farhat and the entire ACTS team. Our approach to Azure is industry cloud-first to help our clients address their most pressing and important challenges that face financial services firms every day.”

James Farhat, ACTS founder and CEO, added:

“The cloud is continually evolving, meaning there is a ton of opportunity for further innovation and advancement. I am incredibly proud of what we've built at ACTS and am excited for the next chapter. Together, PwC and ACTS will aim to help companies innovate faster and accelerate their cloud journey, delivering strong results for clients and continuing to be an industry leader throughout the financial services space and beyond.”

PwC’s M&A Activity

PwC remains active in the M&A market, acquiring a range of technology service providers, IT consultants, MSPs and cybersecurity companies. ChannelE2E maintains a regularly updated list of PwC acquisitions and investments, and their areas of focus here.

Most recently, PwC acquired Netrovert, a consultancy that focuses on enterprise integration, largely on the Salesforce MuleSoft platform. PwC acquired Venerate Solutions for Salesforce cloud consulting expertise in June 2022. In May 2022, the firm acquired ID-Consult/METUS and eilersconsulting for supply chain management. In April 2022, PwC acquired Pollen8, a technology consultancy focused on sustainability and green initiatives. In March 2022 the firm acquired a minority stake in Cybus GmbH, an industrial internet-of-things (IIoT) software company and in January 2022 acquired SAP supply chain software expert Olivehorse.

Sharon Florentine

Sharon manages day-to-day content on ChannelE2E and serves as senior managing editor for CyberRisk Alliance’s Channel Brands. She also covers enterprise-class technology companies, strategic alliances and channel partner strategies. Sharon is a veteran tech journalist and editor with more than 25 years experience in the industry, and has previously held key editorial, content and leadership positions at Techstrong Group, CIO.com, Ziff Davis Enterprise and CRN.

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