Ariba Inc. yesterday said it will sell its sourcing and procurement business process outsourcing (BPO) business to consulting and services provider Accenture for $51 million.
The deal will strengthen Accenture’s supply chain management (SCM) expertise, bolstering its existing outsourcing and procurement services “by adding deeper category expertise, highly scalable global sourcing service delivery operations, and proprietary sourcing databases, benchmarks, and technologies,” said Accenture Group Chief Executive Mike Salvino in a prepared statement.
Meanwhile, the sale of the BPO business will allow Ariba to focus on its strategy of becoming “a network company with cloud-based solutions,” Ariba Chief Marketing Officer Tim Minahan said in an e-mail exchange with Managing Automation. “By divesting these assets, we can focus on developing and delivering network-based solutions that enable our customers to drive more efficient and effective commerce.”
The deal is expected to close by the end of the year, the companies said. It calls for all 160 employees of Ariba’s Spend Management Services organization, as well as those employees in its Global Services organization associated with category execution and market-making, to join Accenture.