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CGI's Q2 results (period ending 31st March 2025) show total revenue reaching CAN$4.02 billion, representing a robust 7.6% year-on-year increase (3.3% in constant currency). This growth was driven by recent acquisitions and organic growth within government and financial services vertical markets, partially offset by lower demand in the manufacturing, retail, and distribution (MRD), and communications sectors.
The UK & Australia segment stood out as the top performer, with revenue growing by 18.6% year-on-year to CAN$477.0 million (12.1% in constant currency). This impressive growth was significantly influenced by CGI's acquisition of Leeds-based BJSS, which completed on 25th February 2025 (see *UKHotViewsExtra* CGI to buy BJSS: UK headcount boost of 40% | TechMarketView).
With just over a month of BJSS revenue contribution in the quarter (estimated at around CAN$51 million based on BJSS's pre-acquisition annual revenue), we estimate that approximately 12.7 percentage points of the 18.6% growth came from the acquisition, suggesting an organic growth rate of approximately 5.9%.
This estimated organic growth represents an improvement from Q1 FY25's more modest 3.2% constant currency growth, though not quite matching the stronger 7.2% constant currency growth seen in Q4 FY24. Looking at the broader trend, UK & Australia growth has been on a recovery trajectory after a particularly weak period in the middle of FY24 (when constant currency growth was 0.0% and 0.4% in Q2 and Q3 respectively), with the BJSS acquisition now providing significant additional momentum (see CGI FY24: financial strength to be active consolidator | TechMarketView).
While the topline growth was strong, the UK & Australia segment's adjusted EBIT margin decreased to 14.5% from 16.0% in the same period last year, primarily due to "the dilutive impact of a recent business acquisition." This margin compression is typical following major acquisitions as integration activities progress. In Q1 (before the BJSS acquisition), the UK & Australia segment had maintained a stronger adjusted EBIT margin of 16.5%.
On a client geographic basis, government, alongside communications and utilities, were the top two vertical markets for UK & Australia, generating combined revenues of approximately CAN$378 million for the quarter. The addition of BJSS enhances CGI's capabilities across both public and private sectors, with BJSS having particular strength in health (approaching £100m in annual revenue) – see Public sector supplier prospects 2025 and beyond | TechMarketView.
The UK & Australia segment continues to show healthy demand, with bookings of CAN$536.4 million for the quarter and a book-to-bill ratio of 109.7% for the trailing twelve months. This positive ratio indicates continued momentum in securing new business, suggesting sustained growth potential beyond the immediate boost from the BJSS acquisition.
The March 2025 completion of a US$650 million senior unsecured notes offering (see CGI secures $650M in debt financing, signalling potential M&A activity | TechMarketView) provides financial flexibility, potentially signalling continued M&A activity in line with CEO François Boulanger's stated intention for CGI to act as "an active consolidator in the market.
Posted by: Georgina O'Toole at 20:30
Tags:
results
IT+services
Mastek's UK Secure Government Services business continues to gain momentum despite a challenging public sector landscape, achieving 6% year-on-year growth in FY25 with estimated revenue of £91m-£93m.
In our latest PublicSectorViews report, we examine how Mastek has evolved from a single £1.4m government project in 2014 to managing 21 multi-year contracts today. Four new logos were secured just last quarter, including significant wins with DWP and Post Office.
The report provides an in-depth analysis of Mastek's five core capability areas spanning trade, immigration, security & defence, identity & biometrics, and caseworking automation, with particular strength in AI implementation. Despite facing workforce renewal challenges and public sector spending constraints, Mastek's "delivery first" approach continues to yield results.
*Read the full report* to discover how Mastek is positioning itself for continued growth through strategic initiatives focused on service excellence, data integration, AI capabilities, and expanding its footprint in critical national infrastructure.
If you are not yet a subscriber - or are unsure if your organisation has a corporate subscription - please contact Belinda Tewson to access this research, plus a raft of other deep insights into the UK tech market.
Posted by: Georgina O'Toole at 15:06
Tags:
defence
strategy
health
digital
data
central+government
public sector
Live for members of our Tech User Programme (TUP) is TechMarketView’s latest Market Readiness Index report: Market Readiness Index: The Road to AI Part 2.
Now widely used within the UK senior tech buyer community, the TechMarketView Market Readiness Index is based on a proprietary assessment methodology created to understand and quantify the performance of tech suppliers.
This report has been specifically created to enable senior tech buyers to understand the ability of the leading UK IT Services providers to support their AI journey. Those in this year’s cohort are Top 20 ranking players in the UK market (based on TechMarketView analysis). They are: BT Group, CGI, Deloitte, Fujitsu, Kyndryl, NTT Data, PwC, Sopra Steria, Tech Mahindra, and Wipro.
We would like to thank the suppliers for their help in providing extensive information, time with their Executives, and access to clients.
Methodology
By applying our highly regarded, rigorous, research approach, TechMarketView analysts have assessed suppliers across six areas as they pertain to AI: Corporate Resilience; Suitability of Offerings; Skills & Resources; Partner Ecosystem; Industry Expertise; and Delivery & Execution. This involves undertaking multiple in-depth research interviews with various functions/leaders within the supplier organisation to gain an extensive understanding of strategy, capability, investments and so on. Much of this information is not available in the public domain, and combined with our proprietary data and analysis enables our analysts to construct unique profiling of suppliers.
The MRI – much like Magnetic Resonance Imaging – uncovers both the strengths and the weaknesses and exposes what must be done to improve. Analysts score suppliers across six main areas, with each one containing several further sub-category scoring areas. All scores are then put through a rigorous peer review/benchmarking process to ensure the cohort has been scored fairly and accurately.
The transition from early AI experimentation to value realisation is now well underway. Organisations are increasingly focused on securing faster returns on investment while carefully selecting use cases that deliver tangible business value. But who are your most suitable supplier partners? Find out who and why, here:
Market Readiness Index: The Road to AI Part 2
If you are not a member of the Tech User Programme and would like to find out more, please be in touch.
This MRI is also available to buy as a standalone report.
Contact Belinda Tewson.
Posted by: HotViews Editor at 10:20
Netcall and C2-Ai have announced a partnership intended to help healthcare, local government, and housing organisations better understand the risks and requirements of patients and citizens.
The new arrangement will combine Netcall's process automation and customer engagement capabilities with C2-Ai's tools that help health systems create patient risk profiles to reduce avoidable harm, mortality, and cost. It is intended to enable organisations combine and analyse multi-agency data and make coordinated decisions to reduce risk and improve outcomes.
The companies believe the partnership will reinforce the patient intelligence picture, allowing patients to be identified early as being at high-risk of A&E admission, harm, or complications. It could also enable councils to utilise data from social housing or social care teams. This would help identify factors contributing to an individual's health deterioration, enabling earlier intervention. They also see potential in helping community pharmacists take a coordinated approach to reducing hospital admission.
The partnership aligns to the government’s plan to reform the NHS, which is framed around three shifts in approach: 1) moving from an analogue to a digital NHS; 2) moving more care from hospitals to communities; and 3) moving from sickness to prevention (see A major tilt towards technology in the NHS).
Although both companies have already demonstrated success working with individual NHS organisations and local authorities, multi-agency collaboration is a far greater challenge. The situation has been improved through various initiatives, such as the introduction of shared care records, the digital social care record programme and the NHS Federated Data Platform; however, huge quantities of health, social care and local government data remain siloed. AI will help to accelerate data sharing, but effective multi-agency collaboration requires financial and cultural alignment, not just technical solutions.
Posted by: Dale Peters at 10:11
Tags:
nhs
collaboration
AI
data
healthcare
partnership
local+government
social+care
Digital SI, Endava has joined OpenAI’s Beta Services Partner Program. Participation in the initiative has so far been limited to a select handful of
software and services companies. Inclusion allows suppliers to test and provide feedback on the research organisation’s pre-release technologies before they become widely available.
The announcement formalises a successful collaboration over the past year between the two parties on developing industry-first products and services for their joint customers. Endava reports that it has actively delivered AI solutions to multiple clients using OpenAI technologies. These include its agentic AI accelerator, Morpheus, as well as its discovery accelerator for core modernisation, Compass.
Endava is no doubt hoping that the closer ties with OpenAI will help with the revival of the company’s fortunes following a difficult FY24 (see here). The digital SI’s anticipation last September of a return to double-digit top line growth in the current fiscal appear, however, to have been overly optimistic. Despite a solid Q225 performance (see here), Endava is now taking a more cautious view of its prospects for the remainder of the year. FY25 revenue growth guidance was trimmed two months ago from the 10.0% - 11.5% range to between 8.5% and 9.0% yoy at constant currency.
Posted by: Duncan Aitchison at 09:48
Tags:
AI
partnership
Vodafone and UK National Parks have announced a new three-year partnership to deliver a programme of initiatives designed to help protect ecosystems, increase community engagement (around the health benefits which access to nature can bring), and support the future of the National Parks.
Efforts will initially focus on rolling-out AI-powered habitat mapping across the 15 parks, building on Vodafone’s recent network-as-a-sensor trial (which used its mobile network to provide more accurate rain nowcasting along the River Severn). This first project will provide real-time, high-resolution data on biodiversity, habitat health, and visitor impact in a fraction of a time it would normally take to produce manually.
The UK’s 15 National Parks cover c.10% of the country, attracting 90 million visitors annually. As well as providing access to nature for all (enshrined in the post-war National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act), the parks represent a vital natural resource in the current age of environmental impact awareness – 119 million tonnes of carbon are stored in National Park peatland, for example.
Further work as part of the Vodafone partnership is set to include a restoration project in Eryri National Park, and a community engagement programme in Northumberland National Park.
Nature monitoring and management is a key focus for sustainability technology projects. Data from TechMarketView’s upcoming Sustainability Technology Activity Index reports show that it’s the second most common sustainability use case area globally, with 16.5% of the activities logged worldwide in some way contributing to biodiversity tracking, ecosystem health monitoring, verification of natural resources, management and restoration of natural habitats, etc. (and over half of these – 51% - utilise AI).
Look out for the latest Sustainability Technology Activity Index reports, coming soon – with in-depth analysis of the global picture (segmented by sector, use case area, and technology) and what the activity trends are telling us in uncertain times, plus deep dives into the UK market specifically. This research is available only to subscribers of SustainabilityViews. If you are not yet a subscriber, or are unsure if your company has a subscription, please contact Belinda Tewson to find out how you can gain access.
Posted by: Craig Wentworth at 09:41
Tags:
nature monitoring
habitat
Coforge has announced that it is to sell its London-based AdvantageGo insurance software business to Sapiens UK for £43m.
The move is part of a strategic review and corporate restructuring exercise being undertaken by the fast-growing mid-tier offshore supplier to sharpen its focus on the IT Services arena. The deal, which looks like a smart play for both parties, is expected to be completed in 4-6 weeks.
Founded as Chaserock in 1990 and acquired by Coforge (the NIIT Technologies) twenty years later, AdvantageGo targets the Commercial and Specialty insurance space and has built a significant position in Lloyd’s Syndicate Market. Described by its current owners as a “stellar” business, the SaaS provider reported yoy revenue growth of almost 60% for the twelve months ended 31st March 2024 to £16.4m or c.7% of Coforge’s UK turnover for the period.
As we noted in a recent UK Insurance Sector Suppliers, Trends and Forecasts report (see here), Sapiens has become one of the leading software suppliers to the reinsurance sector in this country. The purchase of AdvantageGo is expected to enhance the acquirer’s proposition to the London Specialty Market. It will also increase the functionality of Sapien’s Insurance Platform for Property & Casualty through the integration within it of AdvantageGo’s underwriting workbench software.
Posted by: Duncan Aitchison at 09:39
Tags:
saas
software
disposal
insurance
The security of both the data to feed AI solutions, as well as the underlying models and agents themselves, is an area of increasing focus by many organisations. In response security suppliers are developing new solutions to address this area of burgeoning demand. The latest announcements come from platform leaders Palo Alto Networks and CrowdStrike, who have both just announced new solutions aimed at enhancing their AI security propositions.
Palo Alto Networks has unveiled Prisma AIRS, an AI security platform designed to offer protection for the entire enterprise AI ecosystem, including applications, agents, models, and data. Prisma AIRS provides several key security capabilities, including AI model scanning to detect vulnerabilities, posture management to monitor permissions and data exposures, AI red teaming to simulate attacks against AI systems, runtime security to guard against evolving threats during operation, and security for AI agents, including those built with no-code or low-code tools.
AI model scanning enables organisations to assess their AI models for vulnerabilities such as tampering, malicious scripts, and deserialization attacks. This component aims to help organisations adopt AI models safely by identifying security risks before deployment.
Palo Alto has also announced it has agreed to acquire Protect AI, a company focused on the security of artificial intelligence and machine learning applications, in a move to further bolster its suite of AI security offerings, likely feeding into Prisma AIRS.
CrowdStrike meanwhile has introduced a collection of new capabilities aimed at providing real-time data protection across cloud infrastructures, AI models, endpoints, and SaaS applications. The set of products and features are designed to address the evolving methods by which adversaries target and extract sensitive information. One of the key advances highlighted by CrowdStrike is Falcon Cloud Security's ability to inspect AI models for malware, backdoors, and other alterations before they are deployed in production environments. Security teams will receive real-time visibility into all AI workloads within the cloud, supporting proactive risk management in an area seeing rapid growth and increasing interest from threat actors.
Posted by: Simon Baxter at 09:19
The UK Government has set out its preferred approach to governing crypto-based assets in a move that also hints at an attempt to align the countries technology industry more closely with the US going forward. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves, announced the changes during UK Fintech Week in London on Tuesday.
The UK’s proposed rules, outlined by the Treasury in a new policy paper, will cover crypto exchanges and brokers and provide financial services regulator the FCA with more powers to oversee digital assets. Meanwhile, Reeves has indicated that the UK will exempt overseas stablecoin issuers from any new rules, committing to closer co-operation with the US in regulating the emerging global market for digital assets.
In the US, President Donald Trump has indicated that he plans to create a more liberal regulatory environment within which digital assets can thrive with the goal of making the country “the crypto capital of the world”.
The latest draft rule changes are an amendment to the Financial Services and Markets Act of 2000 and are designed to implement regulatory boundaries that promote safe and responsible technological advancement. The proposals are in response to the burgeoning interest in crypto assets in the UK and globally. According to the FCA, UK crypto ownership rose to 12% in 2024 from just 4% in 2021.
Reeves has also revealed ongoing discussions with the US to coordinate on digital asset policy. Talks with her US counterpart, Scott Bessent during her recent visit to America apparently included proposals for a “transatlantic sandbox” for digital securities. The UK and the US plan to continue this dialogue.
The UK’s planned stablecoin regulation contrasts with the far stricter approach of the EU, which came into force in December 2024. Any company selling a stablecoin to EU investors must secure authorisation from European regulators. The US also requires “significant” stablecoins to meet tough rules on liquidity and reserves.
The latest news marks a potentially major step forward for crypto assets in the UK. The approach outlined by the UK Government appears to be in sync with the US, bringing crypto assets into the orbit of existing regulatory frameworks rather than developing specific legislation. The UK crypto sector, which has seen the majority of recent applications rejected by the FCA on AML grounds, is likely to welcome the government’s proposals and the prospect of a more liberal approach to governance.
Posted by: Jon C Davies at 09:17
Sopra Steria fell back in the first quarter of FY 2025 buffeted by “challenging market conditions”, with revenue of €1,415m representing a -4.7% decline year-on-year. The organic contraction of -4.9% came in slightly better than the forecasted range of between -5% to -6%.
The European IT services provider faced headwinds across its different regions. France, their largest market at 43% of revenue, contracted by -4.9% amid political instability and delayed public sector decisions. The UK segment experienced a more pronounced -10.8% decline, though this was anticipated due to a high comparison base and contract timing issues. The Europe reporting unit posted a -3.3% organic contraction, with Spain and Italy showing encouraging growth of 5-8%, offsetting weakness in Scandinavia, Germany and Benelux.
CEO Cyril Malargé highlighted several positive developments. The aeronautics sector has stabilised since Q4 2024, while the NS&I programme in the UK (see NS&I proves a happy hunting ground for Sopra Steria), started on at the beginning of April, should boost Q2 performance. Additionally, six major SSCL platform contracts were extended last week for £300m over three years, securing business through 2028.
Looking ahead, Sopra Steria expects the negative growth trend to ease in Q2 2025 and has confirmed its full-year targets of between -2.5% to +0.5% organic growth and an operating margin between 9.3% and 9.8%. The company continues to pursue its 2028 strategic vision of establishing itself as a European leader in consulting and digital services.
Posted by: Marc Hardwick at 09:04
Tags:
results
IT+services
Retailer Marks & Spencer (M&S) has been experiencing major disruptions due to a cyber attack that has affected several parts of its operations over the past week. The company suspended online orders as it worked to recover from the incident, which impacted contactless payments, Click & Collect services, and caused delivery delays. Some stores have also been left with empty food shelves, while around 200 warehouse workers were asked to stay home while the company investigates and restores services. M&S has reportedly brought in cybersecurity firms including CrowdStrike, Microsoft, and Fenix24 to help manage the incident.
According to a report by Bleeping Computer, the cyberattack has been linked to a group of threat actors known as "Scattered Spider", also referred to by other names such as Octo Tempest. The group is known for using social engineering techniques like phishing, MFA fatigue attacks, and SIM swapping to gain access to large organisations. In this case, attackers are believed to have gained access to M&S systems in February, stealing a sensitive Windows file (NTDS.dit) containing password hashes. This enabled them to move through the company’s network and eventually deploy ransomware.
Scatted Spider previously breached MGM Resorts in 2023, utilising a social engineering attack impersonating an employee when calling the company's IT help desk. In this attack, the threat actors deployed the BlackCat ransomware to encrypt more than 100 VMware ESXi hypervisors. The specific ransomware used in the attack on M&S is believed to be DragonForce, which encrypted virtual machines on M&S’s VMware servers.DragonForce itself is a newer ransomware operation that began in December 2023 and has recently started offering its tools to other cybercriminal groups as a white-labelled service.
It has been a while since we saw a ransomware attack on this scale, and one focused on locking down systems rather than data theft (and ransom to get it back), which has become more common. In the latest Cyber breaches survey, it was reported that ransomware incidents doubled over the past year (See - 2025 Cyber Security Breaches Survey: Rising ransomware and declining board responsibility), and continues to be one of the main cyber threats to organisations, often facilitated through stolen identity credentials.
Posted by: Simon Baxter at 08:37
London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) has extended its multi-year relationship with Amazon Web Services (AWS), announcing the hyperscaler as its preferred cloud provider for its Markets, Risk Intelligence, and FTSE Russell divisions.
As a global market infrastructure and data provider, resilience and security sit at the heart of LSEG’s operations. Cloud is central to ensuring the delivery of its services to customers, not least around providing safe and reliable access for those in the demanding areas of trading and risk management.
LSEG is also using both AWS Outposts (a managed service for hybrid cloud environments) and Amazon Bedrock (a managed service for accessing GenAI foundation models). The latter is being used in LSEG’s Risk Intelligence division for faster and more accurate risk analysis.
For its latest financial year (FY24), AWS broke through the $100bn revenue barrier. It remains the largest hyperscaler both globally and in the UK.
Posted by: Kate Hanaghan at 09:35
Tags:
contract
hyperscaler
UK-based asset finance specialist, Alfa Financial Software, has released a trading statement for the first three months of 2025 highlighting strong revenue growth and a healthy sales pipeline. The update for the quarter ended 31 March 2025 revealed that Q1 revenue grew by 20% year-on-year to £31m (up 21% on a constant currency basis)
After closing out FY24 strongly with total revenue up 8% and subscription revenue up 18% Alfa enjoyed continued strong sequential growth in Subscription revenue, up 6% on Q4 FY24 and 21% versus Q1 FY24. Software Engineering revenue was up 79% versus Q1FY24 following a shift back to client-led enhancement work in H2 FY24. Delivery revenues grew 8% versus Q1 FY24 whilst Q1 TCV reached a record £227m, versus £190m in Q1 FY24.
Alongside the update, Alfa’s CEO, Andrew Denton expressed his confidence in the overall strength of the company’s pipeline with recruitment continuing across the UK, Europe and the US to accommodate the growing demand. Denton also indicated that US tariffs have had no direct impact on Alfa's business and that it had so far experienced no change in buyer behaviour. As a result, Alfa’s management continues to believe that the underlying market conditions for continued growth remain positive.
Posted by: Jon C Davies at 09:29
Customer management outsourcer Firstsource has delivered strong growth for FY25, reaching a significant milestone of $1bn annualised revenue run-rate. The RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group company posted impressive Q4 results with revenues of $250m, up 29.4% YoY, while full-year revenues climbed 25.9% to $944m.
The firm's ‘UnBPO’ approach (as we have described here) looks like it is hitting the mark, shifting from traditional cost-saving outsourcing to a tech-driven, outcome-focused partnership model. This strategy has helped secure 14 large deals in FY25 – including their largest-ever healthcare deal – and attracted 43 new logos. Cut through the marketing spiel and it looks like a proposition increasingly based on process delivery by Gen and Agentic AI-based solutions with a new commercial wrapper.
Particularly noteworthy is their Agentic AI Studio initiative, which breaks down work into specialised tasks executed by AI-driven agents, helping redefine workflows. This emphasis on AI integration is complemented by substantial investment in training and talent development, with over 200,000 ‘digital learning hours’ delivered across GenAI, automation and domain-specific skills.
The UK remains Firstsource’s second largest market (after the US) with a business operating across a range of clients in the Media (e.g. Sky), Financial Services, Utilities and Retail sectors. A quick crunch of this morning’s numbers gives us an estimate that the business is worth close to £233m per annum in revenue which would represent growth of 8% in the UK – good going given the market conditions and pressure of commoditisation.
Looking ahead, Firstsource has issued bullish guidance for FY26, projecting 12-15% constant currency revenue growth with operating margins between 11.25-12%. This suggests their pivot towards AI-enabled transformation services is resonating with clients looking to reimagine operations in an increasingly digital and automated landscape.
Posted by: Marc Hardwick at 09:23
Tags:
results
CXM
The improving top line momentum seen by Capgemini UK during the second half of FY24 stepped up further during Q125. Revenue in the region for the three months ended 31st March was up 3.8% yoy at constant currency to €728m, driven largely by increases in demand from clients in the financial services, energy & utilities and public sectors. Large wins in the latter during the period included the securing a place on the £1.2bn Digital Capability for Health 2 framework and a new a six-year call-off contract valued at up £100m with HMRC (see here).
The first quarter ended somewhat better than expected at the global level. Q125 turnover declined by just 0.4% yoy to €5.55bn (Q424: -1.1%). The number included a c.€55m contribution from recent acquisitions, most notably the purchase of enterprise data management software and services provider, Syniti last summer. While most of Capgemini’s vertical units delivered an uptick in performance during the period, the firm’s manufacturing sector unit, and within it sales of the firm’s engineering services, continued to struggle. Revenue in the segment was down 5.9% yoy to €1.5bn, albeit the pace of decline stabilised.
Bookings for the first three months of 2025 held up well. These improved by 2.8% yoy to €5.88bn. This was supported by accelerating sales of AI-related services which accounted for c.6% of the new business signed in Q1 (FY24: 4%).
Capgemini CEO, Aiman Ezzat reaffirmed the cautious view of the outlook for the business provided in February. He reported that the firm had not yet seen any material changes to buyer decision making and expects the H125 top line will, as previously anticipated, maintain the H224 cadence to decline by c.1% yoy. For the year as a whole, Capgemini’s revenue growth guidance remains unchanged at between -2.0% to +2.0% at constant currency in FY25. The broader than usual range reflects the uncertainties surrounding both where the USA’s tariff policy will land and what its impacts will be on global trade (see our recent US-UK Tariff Situation report for more detail). It will not be a surprise to see this projection changed come the publication of the H1 results in July.
Posted by: Duncan Aitchison at 08:55
Tags:
results
IT+services
Accenture has launched Trusted Agent Huddle, a new feature of its AI Refinery platform, aimed at enabling AI agents from different systems and vendors to work together in a single platform. ‘Huddle’ will allow organisations to select and manage the right agents for different tasks and business objectives, without having to become locked into specific vendor ecosystems.
Trusted Agent Huddle uses open communication standards, such as Agent2Agent and Model Context Protocol, to enable agents from platforms like AWS, Google Cloud, Microsoft, Salesforce, and others to interoperate. It also includes an algorithm that evaluates how well individual agents perform, with plans to introduce a trust scoring system in the future. ‘Huddle’ is part of Accenture’s AI Refinery, which is built on NVIDIA AI Enterprise. It can also integrate with NVIDIA’s Agent Intelligence toolkit to further support communication between agents and systems
The system is intended to let businesses coordinate AI-driven processes that span across multiple tools or platforms without needing to rebuild or replace existing software. It supports agents built on cloud-hosted models and allows organisations to manage and adapt them as business needs change. FedEx is among the first companies working with Accenture to explore how the tool could be used in supply chain operations.
Agentic AI is one of the big themes for 2025, as covered in our 2025 Predictions. Alongside the adoption of more autonomous agents and advanced copilots, we also highlighted that “These agents will take many forms, requiring both human oversight and new “orchestration agents” to manage deployment across different business domains”. There is a growing need for interoperability in AI systems, as companies increasingly adopt tools from multiple providers, but which may not necessarily work seamlessly together. System integrators are going to be well placed to act as the orchestrators of this new agentic fuelled market, and it would seem Accenture is ahead of the game in productising a solution to exploit this.
Posted by: Simon Baxter at 08:17
Posted by: HotViews Editor at 07:00
Former EY UK Chairman Steve Varley and PwC UK's Marissa Thomas have launched Unity Advisory with $300m in private equity backing. Promising no audit conflicts, AI-driven solutions, and performance-based fees, this new venture emerges just as the Big 4 face significant headwinds, with our research showing EY UK, Deloitte UK, and PwC UK all experiencing slowdowns and announcing staff cuts.
Can this PE-backed challenger truly disrupt the consulting status quo, or will it face the same structural challenges? Read our full analysis to discover what makes Unity's model potentially revolutionary and the significant hurdles it must overcome.
If you are a TechMarketView subscriber, you can access this research now: Unity Advisory launching to disrupt Big 4 | TechMarketView. If you are not yet a subscriber - or if you are unsure if your organisation has a corporate subscription, please contact Belinda Tewson to discover how to access this and far more besides.
Posted by: Georgina O'Toole at 09:47
Tags:
funding
investment
consulting
big+4
advisory
consultancy
SS&C Technologies, the global provider of services and software to the financial services and healthcare industries (and the owner of RPA specialist Blue Prism) has published its results for the first three months of 2025. The Q1 financials highlighted the US vendor’s continued revenue growth coupled with a healthy improvement in profit. For the period ended 31 March 2025, global revenue was up 5.5% to $1.5bn, whilst net income rose by 7.5% to $357.9m.
Software enabled services rose by 6.9% in the first quarter of the new fiscal to reach $1.27bn, whilst SS&C’s legacy License and Maintenance revenue declined by 1.3% to $244m. At a segment level, SS&C’s Wealth and Investment Technologies business was up 3.9% to $1.5bn, Intelligent Automation and Analytics was up 2.3% to $558m, Global Investor and Distribution Solutions (SS&C’s platform provides transfer agency and investor servicing) was up 3.2% to $1.5bn, Intralinks (M&A data platform) was up 3.4% to $565m, GlobeOp (Fund Administration) was up 10.3% to $1.6bn and Healthcare was down 0.4% to $270m. Overall, SS&C’s recurring revenue from financial services was up 5.9% in Q1.
In April this year SS&C secured another win in the UK with the expansion of its relationship with investment management firm, T. Rowe Price. The deal saw the global retirement specialist extend its transfer agency agreement with SS&C Global Investor and Distribution Solutions (GIDS) for its UK fund range. Meanwhile, in January, UK asset manager Omnis Investments, also extended its relationship with SS&C (see: Omnis extends SS&C deal).
Commenting on SS&C’s strong start to the year, SS&C’s Chairman and CEO, Bill Stone said that the company remained “excited about our 2025 growth plans. As we begin to embed AI and Quantum technologies into our products and services.” As the widespread transformation of the global financial services sector continues SS&C appears increasingly well positioned to take advantage of the trends.
Posted by: Jon C Davies at 09:29
A new report from Google reveals the UK could unlock up to £400bn in economic growth by doubling its adoption of AI. The ‘AI Works’ study stresses that workforce engagement is critical, with half of the projected gains dependent on widespread, productive use of AI tools. Yet, a major adoption gap threatens progress, as two-thirds of UK workers have never used GenAI at work.
Accessibility remains a key barrier. Women over 55 are four times less likely to use AI than men under 35 according to Google's research. Simple measures like clear policies and guardrails, ‘permission to prompt’ and a few hours of training, can double daily AI use, saving workers an estimated 122 hours annually. Most participants in the study initially viewed AI as useful only for emails and document summaries, however, post-training over 80% were surprised by its broader capabilities, with 70% independently innovating three months later.
Google has also urged UK government policymakers to take action, providing AI training for all public sector workers, ensuring NHS, local government, and civil service employees are equipped with AI skills. Other suggested actions include; a national AI adoption trial focused on the hardest to reach frontline service delivery teams and back-office personnel; the appointment of an AI leader in every government department; and the launch of regular AI audits to track progress. Additionally, a Skills England-backed accreditation system for short, impactful AI training modules should be established to foster a culture of lifelong learning.
The findings from Google’s study very much echo the sentiment in TechMarketViews own AI research, See - AI Impact: Back Office Operations, that upskilling is crucial for end user organisations. We also highlighted that “considerations should be given on new programmes to support entry levels jobs and apprenticeships. Existing role profiles may also need to be reshaped due to the tasks AI supports”. The productivity challenge will soon extend beyond just the use of AI, as it also starts to replace and reshape roles, with the impact likely to be felt heavily on entry level positions, and roles with high levels of easily automated processes and data entry.
Fully realising the economic benefits from AI will require widespread adoption. Access to AI-powered tools is a big part of that, but without the skills to fully utilise them the potential gains are likely to go unfulfilled. I would echo Googles well-made points, that we need to see more from the UK government to fully activate and enable the use of AI across the public and private sectors.
Posted by: Simon Baxter at 09:19
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