NelsonHall recently attended Dreamforce, the annual Salesforce flagship event in San Francisco. Billed as the largest AI conference in the world, Dreamforce 2024 saw a marketing push like none other, even by Salesforce’s standards, towards Agentforce, its new platform for creating autonomous AI agents capable of analyzing data, making decisions, and taking action. Agents built [...]

  During the summer of 2023, we met with Mohammed Sijelmassi, Sopra Steria’s CTO and Digital Transformation Office head and discussed how Sopra Steria was deploying internally and helping clients externally with GenAI and LLMs. Earlier this month, we met with Mr. Sijelmassi again to assess Sopra Steria’s progress on its transformation, its work with clients, and use cases. [...]

  NelsonHall recently attended UiPath’s Forward VI event in Las Vegas, at which the company launched its Autopilot capabilities. While the company launched Autopilot across all its platform components, including Studio, Assistant, Apps, mining, and Test Manager, this blog focuses on its use within Studio and Assistant.  Autopilot for Studio A constant inhibitor to auto[...]

  Sopra Steria is the latest vendor to announce a significant investment in GenAI/LLMs and its incorporation into its software engineering platform (Ingine). We recently met with Mohammed Sijelmassi, who holds two roles at Sopra Steria: CTO and Digital Transformation Office. We discussed how Sopra Steria is deploying internally and helping clients externally with GenAI and LLMs. [...]

  We recently talked with TCS’ Salesforce practice about its verticalization initiatives. Product verticalization has been one of Salesforce’s key strategies (along with Customer 360/cross-selling and geographic expansion) since 2014, when it launched its Industries business unit. Like SAP, Salesforce acknowledges that organizations spend time and effort customizing thei[...]

  Automation Anywhere recently announced new capabilities for its platform powered by generative AI: Automation Co-Pilot for Business Users and for Automators, plus Document Automation. Here I take a look at these new capabilities and how they compare with those of other providers, and consider the wider implications of generative AI solutions for automation developers. Automation C[...]

  NelsonHall recently attended an IBM Security analyst day in London. This covered recent developments such as IBM’s acquisition of Polar Security on May 16th to support the monitoring of data across hybrid cloud estates, and watsonx developments to support the move away from rule-based security. However, a big focus of the event was the subject of risk. For the last few years[...]

  We recently talked to NTT DATA about its pending acquisition of Apisero, announced last month. NTT DATA has been through significant changes recently with its merger with NTT Ltd. NTT Ltd. grouped a wide range of network and connectivity services, hardware and related services, data center hosting, IT infrastructure services, and resales. The resulting NTT DATA is now a giant with[...]

  NelsonHall recently attended Automation Anywhere's 2020 innovation day, where the company launched its Automation Anywhere Robotic Interface (AARI) digital assistant focused on making bot usage easier and more accessible to employees. Automation Anywhere Robotic Interface AARI “aims to elevate employees' workflows in the same manner as at-home digital assistants s[...]

  Last week, NelsonHall attended ANTENNA2020, AntWorks’ yearly analyst retreat. AntWorks has made considerable progress since its last analyst retreat, experiencing considerable growth (estimated at ~260%) in the three quarters ending January 2020, and employing 604 personnel at the end of this period. By geography, AntWorks’ most successful geography remains APAC, close[...]

  Reboot work was the slogan for UiPath’s recent Forward III partner event, a reference to rethinking the way we work. UiPath’s vision is to elevate employees above repetitive and tedious tasks to a world of creative, fulfilling work. The company’s vision is driven by an automation first mindset, along with the concept of a bot for everyone and human-automation collab[...]

  DXC Technology recently held an analyst day in the U.K., its first since being ‘born’ on April 1. It is still early days for this young organization and the integration continues (though there was little mention of this at the event). In its recent investor calls, DXC Technology has emphasized actions to strip out costs, apply financial discipline, and invest in next[...]

M&A activity in IT services is set to take a new direction in 2017. Here, I reflect on M&A activity by the largest IT services vendors in 2016, with its emphasis on mega deals, and look ahead to 2017, which is set to be the year of digital & security tuck-in acquisitions. Large M&As in 2016: IT Conglomerates and Defense Firms Divest IT Services Arms Large-scale M&am[...]

Sopra Steria announced recently its 2015 results (click here for more information on the recent results). The results contained a number of surprises. Our key take-aways from the results are discussed below. Strong Financial Performance in French Operations in Spite of Merger Credit is due to Sopra Steria’s management in managing the rapid turnaround of Steria France in spite of i[...]

NIIT Technologies recently shared insights regarding its push into digital services. This digital push adds to existing priorities, which include growth intentions in North America and Europe and a strong focus on its IT infrastructure services. Meanwhile, the company is maintaining its established focus on clients in three core verticals: transportation, insurance and BFS (which combined acc[...]

CSC has announced a planned break up by October 25 2015 into two firms: CSC U.S. Public Sector (FY 15 revenues: $4.1bn) and CSC Global Commercial ($8.1bn, also includes non-U.S. public sector). See here for details: The announcement ends a long period of speculation over the posssible sale of CSC's North American Public Sector unit[...]

Sopra Steria has announced its financial results for 2014, focusing on its profitability performance (revenues were previously published in February). Our key takeaways from the announcement are discussed here. U.K. Will Continue to Outperform Other Sopra Steria Geographies in 2015 Sopra Steria U.K. had phenomenal growth in 2014 (+18.2% organically) to ~€859m. Profitability was high (ad[...]

Tech Mahindra has agreed to acquire SOFGEN to enhance its core banking systems integration (build, run, operate) capabilities. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of March. Swiss-headquartered SOFGEN is a specialist in Avaloq and Temenos platforms and also has capabilities in TCS BaNCS and Misys. SOFGEN has 450 employees, including >70[...]

EVRY has announced its largest shareholders, Posten Norgen and Telenor Business Partner Invest are to sell their shares (representing a combined 70.24% of capital) to Apax Partners. Apax Partners has secured an additional 3.15% of EVRY shares from Folketrygdfondet (Norway’s government pension fund) and is to launch a NOK 16 per share all-cash public tender. The tender values EVRY at ~$6[...]

NelsonHall recently attended Luxoft’s first ever analyst event in New York. Luxoft is a young company - it was founded in 2000 - that is enjoying very fast growth (20%-25% depending on the year). For its FY 2015 it has guided on revenue growth of at least 28% (of which 25% organic) and an adjusted EBITDA margin in the 17% to 19% target range. Luxoft is targeting $1bn in annual revenues[...]