Accenture has acquired UK synthetic intelligence (AI) agency School, bolstering its AI pool with 400 specialists because it expands its companies to assist companies ship worth from AI initiatives.
Via the acquisition, School’s enterprise determination intelligence product, Frontier, will be a part of Accenture’s suite of merchandise that assist organisations make higher, quicker choices by connecting knowledge, AI fashions and enterprise processes right into a unified determination system.
Accenture mentioned it has been working with School since 2023, supporting its purchasers in life sciences corporations, akin to Novartis, to make use of Frontier to remodel the economics of scientific trial planning and execution.
Julie Candy, chair and CEO of Accenture, mentioned: “With School, we’ll additional speed up our technique to carry trusted, superior AI to the center of our purchasers’ companies.”
School was dubbed “the Vote Depart AI agency” by The Guardian for its work with former UK prime minister Boris Johnson’s chief adviser, Dominic Cummings, and the Vote Depart marketing campaign to sway public opinion on the UK 2016 referendum to depart the European Union.
Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, School constructed the NHS’s Early Warning System, which was used day by day by NHS Gold Command to foretell affected person demand throughout the nation.
Beneath the earlier Tory authorities, School labored with the AI Security Institute to research methods that might be used to beat safeguards in massive language fashions (LLMs).
In a Pc Weekly article revealed in 2022, School’s CEO, Marc Warner, who will now turn out to be chief expertise officer at Accenture, wrote in regards to the drawbacks of data-driven decision-making. He said that if data-driven decision-making labored, the immense development in knowledge storage expertise within the IT trade ought to have led to vastly improved organisational efficiency. On the time, he predicted the way forward for AI could be in determination intelligence.
The mix of Accenture and School creates a formidable group to speed up the supply of superior AI and knowledge options that drive sustainable development Matt Prebble, Accenture
Commenting on the Accenture acquisition, Warner mentioned: “Our imaginative and prescient has all the time been a world by which secure AI delivers widespread advantages to humanity. We’ve got spent the final 10 years supporting our purchasers to carry this world about, step-by-step. As AI advances quickly, the ambition of our purchasers is now, rightly, at least the reinvention of their enterprise. I’m delighted that by teaming up with Accenture, we have now all the things in place to help AI transformation from begin to end.”
Accenture mentioned it could even be taking over board School’s Fellowship Program, which offers a structured early profession coaching and placement programme to assist PhD and grasp’s graduates, in addition to post-doctoral researchers, transition from academia to trade. Constructing on its success within the UK, Accenture mentioned it plans to increase the programme globally to its folks in addition to to purchasers.
Matt Prebble, head of Accenture within the UK and Eire, mentioned: “Companies are underneath growing stress to ship productiveness positive aspects from AI investments and strengthen competitiveness. The mix of Accenture and School creates a formidable group to speed up the supply of superior AI and knowledge options that drive sustainable development. School’s distinctive place within the AI sector reinforces our dedication to supporting purchasers as they navigate change and seize alternatives in right now’s financial system.”
