Accenture has agreed to acquire Udacity, a digital education company based in Silicon Valley. Simultaneously, the Dublin, Ireland-headquartered consultancy has announced the debut of its learning platform, Accenture LearnVantage.
Established in 2011, Udacity has shifted its focus from consumer-oriented online courses to corporate-centered career development programs in AI and technology over the years. The company boasts a network of 1,400 experts and an extensive library of exclusive content developed in collaboration with partners such as Accenture, Microsoft, and Nvidia.
With over 21 million registered users spanning 195 countries, Udacity offers localized courses in languages including English, Spanish, Arabic, and Korean.
The team of 230 professionals from Udacity will integrate into the newly launched LearnVantage platform. Accenture plans to inject $1 billion into the platform over three years, which will deliver technology and training services to assist clients in reskilling and upskilling employees in the realms of technology, data, and AI.
According to research by Accenture, the primary challenge identified by business leaders is the need to upskill their workforce. Despite this, only a small fraction of organizations, approximately 5%, offer comprehensive training in generative AI skills, even though 94% of workers express a desire to learn in this area. Kishore Durg, the global lead of Accenture LearnVantage, highlighted the significance of this trend, emphasizing the transformative impact of generative AI on work processes and the increasing necessity for enterprises to invest in training their employees in cloud, data, and AI. The integration of Udacity into Accenture LearnVantage is expected to leverage Accenture’s extensive learning resources to help clients address this need on a large scale, thereby enhancing their workforce skills to drive greater business value.
Although there were reports of Udacity being targeted for acquisition by upGrad, an Indian edtech firm, for an estimated deal value of $80-$100 million, this potential acquisition did not materialize. Udacity, having previously raised nearly $300 million in funding rounds and achieving unicorn status in 2015, has been a significant player in the education technology sector. The specific financial terms of Accenture’s acquisition of Udacity have not been disclosed and are subject to standard closing conditions. Earlier this year, Accenture also acquired Insight Sourcing, a consulting firm specializing in strategic sourcing and procurement, further broadening its portfolio of services.
Source: Consulting.us
