NEW YORK & PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--
Accenture (NYSE: ACN) has formed a strategic alliance with and made a minority investment in Maana, the pioneer in digital knowledge technology enabling industrial companies to accelerate digital transformation. The alliance will initially target oil and gas clients, with plans to expand to other industries. Terms of the investment were not disclosed.
The Maana Knowledge Platform™, which creates digital knowledge based on human expertise and data and augments people’s abilities to make better and faster decisions, complements Accenture’s deep industry expertise and capabilities. By working together, Accenture can extend its intelligent industry solutions such as Digital Plant Operations and Intelligent Operations Center with Maana’s knowledge platform™, which accelerates creation of knowledge models using its patented knowledge graph and artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms.
Through the use of AI and analytics within the Maana Knowledge Platform™, Accenture can help clients digitize decision flows and optimize assets and operations. For oil and gas companies, this can result in better outcomes in areas that require high volume and high value judgment-based decision-making such as well planning and operations, maintenance, commodity trading and logistics.
“Knowledge-based decision-support platforms are of great interest to many of our oil and gas clients and teaming partners, some of whom are already using Maana’s solutions,” said Andrew Smart, global managing director of Accenture’s energy practice. “We will collaborate with Maana and scale these solutions to help clients take advantage of digital knowledge for operational optimization. With the arrival of the digital Industry X.0 wave, we are already seeing a large number of use cases leveraging Maana’s platform. Furthermore, our investment will help Accenture Applied Intelligence – which combines the power of AI with Accenture’s deep industry and analytics expertise – define new ways of working with clients, using intelligent technology and human ingenuity to deliver greater business value.“
Accenture Ventures drove the investment and alliance formation using an open innovation approach to identify, partner with, and strategically invest in the most promising cutting-edge technologies in the market to quickly scale disruptive innovation. As part of the alliance, Accenture will be the preferred systems integrator for Maana.
“We look forward to our new strategic alliance with Accenture as we collaborate closely to help energy and other clients in their digital transformation journeys,” said Babur Ozden, CEO and co-founder, Maana. “Our alliance indicates that digitization is becoming a critical mainstream activity at the world’s largest industrial companies and demonstrates the demand for Maana’s AI-driven knowledge technology as a key enabler of industrial digital transformation.”
This marks Accenture’s second recent investment in a leading technology firm to help clients solve their most complex business challenges. Last month, Accenture Ventures made a minority investment in and formed an alliance with 1QBit, a leading quantum computing firm based in Vancouver, British Columbia, to help Accenture Applied Intelligence expand its capabilities in quantum computing analytics across several industries, including energy, financial services and life sciences.
About Accenture
Accenture is a leading global professional
services company, providing a broad range of services and solutions in
strategy, consulting, digital, technology and operations. Combining
unmatched experience and specialized skills across more than 40
industries and all business functions – underpinned by the world’s
largest delivery network – Accenture works at the intersection of
business and technology to help clients improve their performance and
create sustainable value for their stakeholders. With approximately
425,000 people serving clients in more than 120 countries, Accenture
drives innovation to improve the way the world works and lives. Visit us
at www.accenture.com.
About Maana
Maana pioneered “digital knowledge technology”
for the enterprise. Maana’s patented Knowledge Graph™ combined with
Maana’s proprietary algorithms, expedites extracting knowledge from data
silos, to reveal their relationships in the context of optimizing
operations and decision flows. Customers include Fortune 500 companies
such as Chevron, GE, Maersk, Shell and Airbus. In 2017 Maana is named
Technology Pioneer by the World Economic Forum. Maana’s strategic
investors are comprised of Intel Capital, GE Ventures, Chevron
Technology Ventures, Saudi Aramco Energy Ventures, Shell Technology
Ventures, CICC and Accenture. Maana is privately held with offices in
Palo Alto, California, Bellevue, Washington, Houston, Texas and multiple
locations in Europe. Visit us at https://www.maana.io/
Twitter:@MaanaKnowledge
LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/company/maana
View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20171219005074/en/
