Ariba and Accenture: Company, Customer and Market Implications of the Acquisition

Spend Matters coverage of Accenture's acquisition of Ariba's sourcing services group has been extensive in the past 24 hours. We've posted four separate pieces covering the announcement and one video. Our coverage started with an article that reported the news, including information shared with Ariba employees and financial analysts. The following posts focused on analyzing the implications of the transaction, starting first by looking at what the deal meant for Accenture. Our next analysis looked at the implications for Ariba. And the final analysis looked at the news from both landscape (i.e., competitive marketplace) and customer perspectives.

You can read the four articles here:

Background on the transaction and initial reporting: Ariba Sells Sourcing Services, BPO Businesses to Accenture

Implications for Accenture: A Look Under the Sourcing Covers: Accenture Picks Up Ariba's Sourcing Services Assets (Part 1)

Implications for Ariba: A Look Under the Sourcing Covers: Accenture Picks Up Ariba's Sourcing Services Assets (Part 2)

Implications for the overall landscape and customers: A Look Under the Sourcing Covers: Accenture Picks Up Ariba's Sourcing Services Assets (Part 3)

If you're more of the video sort, we also taped a quick interview in our offices yesterday looking at the high-level implications of the deal for Ariba, Ariba customers and the broader market.

If you can't tell based on the extensiveness of the coverage, Spend Matters analysis suggests this is deal that will have implications for the market far beyond just Ariba and Accenture. Whether you're an Ariba or Accenture customer, competitor or partner, it will be critical to develop an understanding of the news from multiple vantage points.

Check back tomorrow for a more personal essay on the subject, based on my five years experience working at FreeMarkets. In the meantime, we welcome any feedback or commentary on our coverage so far, as well as general thoughts on the transaction and what it means for the market.

- Jason Busch