Accenture buys New Zealand cloud and IT consultancy Solnet
New Zealand consultancy Solnet has sold to Accenture on the eve of its 20th anniversary, the global powerhouse’s latest acquisition adding another 100 professionals to its local headcount.
Professional services firm Accenture has picked up Wellington-based cloud advisory Solnet, with a team of over 100 practitioners set to join the global consulting powerhouse.
The deal follows three years on from the purchase of local SAP specialist Zag – in a move which supercharged the firm’s New Zealand revenues – and comes in the same week that recent SAP cloud acquisition Bourne Digital officially joined Accenture’s Australian offices.
“New digital technologies are driving productivity across private and public organisations, helping Aotearoa New Zealand to be more competitive in the global economy and improving the services offered to New Zealanders,” said Accenture A/NZ CEO Peter Burns. “Solnet has developed an impressive solution design and delivery skill-set in this space, and they have a strong heritage of delivering large scale projects.”
Approaching its two-decade anniversary, Solnet was established in 2003 by IT industry veteran and managing director Mark Botherway. The company provides digital transformation services to in particular the government, primary industries, and financial services and insurance sectors, covering strategy, experience design, intelligent automation, delivery, and managed services – which Accenture says enables Solnet to support long-term engagements.
“For 20 years, we’ve built an impressive team of technically-skilled and deeply experienced talent,” stated Botherway. “Joining Accenture now gives our people global growth opportunities to broaden their exposure and career potential. We will continue to offer our clients the personalised experience, quality service and support they know and expect, and look forward to accelerating their critical business goals as we add global strength to our local roots.”
The regional market for cloud capabilities shows no signs of slowing down, with Telstra just last month forking out $267 million to scale its business technology services wing via the addition of Melbourne-based cloud services provider Versent. That deal followed a string of cloud acquisitions among the biggest players over the past few years, a number of them made by Accenture, including the reported $45 million paid for Zap and the June purchase of Bourne Digital.
“Cloud is the most powerful tool for organisations to scale rapidly and navigate change,” commented Andy Tay, who heads Accenture’s global Cloud First practice which launched in 2020 with a $3 billion investment. “Solnet brings its extensive experience and strong client relationships, while Accenture brings vast global cloud, data and AI resources. This is a winning combination for New Zealand organisations to digitise faster and become more resilient.”
