July 12, 2017

Accenture Acquires Clearhead to Help Brands Boost the Effectiveness of their Digital Customer Experiences

Acquisition will expand experimentation and personalization capabilities of Accenture Interactive

NEW YORK; July 12, 2017 – Accenture (NYSE: ACN) has acquired Clearhead, the digital optimization company, based in Austin, Texas, to strengthen the personalization services of Accenture Interactive. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Clearhead helps brands continuously test, redesign and personalize digital customer experiences and digital products to optimize business outcomes. This is becoming a critical capability for companies to compete with digital native businesses that seek to improve every aspect of the customer experience through continuous experimentation and testing.

@AccentureSong buys @Clearheadme, helps brands boost digital #CX effectiveness through #experimentation

With a team of more than 70 people, Clearhead enables brands to achieve business outcomes through optimizing key digital marketing, merchandising, sales, and service experiences. Using a proprietary data-driven methodology, Clearhead determines where improving experiences and digital product features may lead to significant gains. It then sets up A/B or multivariate tests to validate these hypotheses, analyzes the results, and redesigns experiences for what works best for customers.

Laser focused on creating the best customer experiences for clients: Accenture Interactive bolsters its experience optimization
and personalization services with the acquisition of Clearhead

Clearhead has served over two dozen retailers and brands, including a global apparel brand for which it developed and tested simpler ways for users to create an online store account. This resulted in an almost 20% increase in account registration. For a home appliances company, Clearhead developed an online product builder and recommender which is based on data and experimentation and significantly increased order conversion rates on the client’s website.

“Experience is the new battleground in the digital world and brands need to continuously optimize it across the entire customer journey,” said Glen Hartman, head of Accenture Interactive North America. “At Accenture Interactive, we’re laser focused on creating the best customer experiences for our clients and we’re excited about Clearhead boosting our personalization business with their experimentation and personalization capabilities.”

“Brands are beginning to realize that experimentation is the new normal and has to be core to their culture, capabilities, and operations in order to offer engaging digital experiences,” said Jeriad Zoghby, global personalization lead, Accenture Interactive. “There’s tremendous potential in this market as some clients are looking to increase the tests they run by a factor of ten year over year. Brands are recognizing that this is the only way to compete with the experiences digital native companies provide. With Clearhead’s talent and methodology, we can help brands achieve their ambitious goals.”

“Clearhead and Accenture Interactive share the belief that continuous experimentation is key to providing the best digital customer experiences and digital products,” said Matty Wishnow, founder and CEO of Clearhead. “We’re excited about how Accenture Interactive works with clients, using agile tools in a collaborative environment to give them the ability to become more user-focused and nimble. Together, we will scale our optimization capabilities and add more value for brands.”

Clearhead’s skills in user experience solutions include Adobe Target, Oracle MaxymiserTM and Monetate. The company is also the reigning Solution Partner of the Year of Optimizely.

Headquartered in Austin, Clearhead also has offices in Cincinnati, Ohio and, most recently, London. Clearhead has been named one of the fastest-growing companies in Central Texas for the past two years and one of the best places to work in the region in 2016 by the Austin Business Journal.

The acquisition bolsters the full suite of digital customer transformation services Accenture Interactive provides to chief marketing officers and chief digital officers, from creative to technology, spanning experience design, marketing, content and commerce.

Clearhead is the fourteenth acquisition Accenture Interactive has made since 2013 to expand the reach, scope, and depth of its end-to-end customer experience services globally. In May, Accenture Interactive acquired e-commerce solution provider Media Hive (US) to strengthen its capabilities around Salesforce Commerce Cloud implementation. Other acquisitions in Accenture’s current fiscal year include creative agencies The Monkeys/Maud (Australia) and Karmarama (UK), communications agency Kunstmaan (Belgium), and digital agency SinnerSchrader (Germany).

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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 more than 411,000 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.

Accenture Interactive
Accenture Interactive, part of Accenture Digital, helps the world’s leading brands transform their customer experiences across the entire customer journey. Through our connected offerings in design, marketing, content and commerce, we create new ways to win in today’s experience-led economy. Accenture Interactive was ranked the world’s largest and fastest-growing digital agency in the latest Ad Age Agency Report. To learn more follow us @AccentureSong and visit www.accentureinteractive.com.

Forward-Looking Statements
Except for the historical information and discussions contained herein, statements in this news release may constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Words such as “may,” “will,” “should,” “likely,” “anticipates,” “expects,” “intends,” “plans,” “projects,” “believes,” “estimates,” “positioned,” “outlook” and similar expressions are used to identify these forward-looking statements. These statements involve a number of risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied. These include, without limitation, risks that: the transaction might not achieve the anticipated benefits for the company; the company’s results of operations could be adversely affected by volatile, negative or uncertain economic conditions and the effects of these conditions on the company’s clients’ businesses and levels of business activity; the company’s business depends on generating and maintaining ongoing, profitable client demand for the company’s services and solutions, including through the adaptation and expansion of its services and solutions in response to ongoing changes in technology and offerings, and a significant reduction in such demand or an inability to respond to the changing technological environment could materially affect the company’s results of operations; if the company is unable to keep its supply of skills and resources in balance with client demand around the world and attract and retain professionals with strong leadership skills, the company’s business, the utilization rate of the company’s professionals and the company’s results of operations may be materially adversely affected; the markets in which the company competes are highly competitive, and the company might not be able to compete effectively; the company could have liability or the company’s reputation could be damaged if the company fails to protect client and/or company data from security breaches or cyberattacks; the company’s profitability could materially suffer if the company is unable to obtain favorable pricing for its services and solutions, if the company is unable to remain competitive, if its cost-management strategies are unsuccessful or if it experiences delivery inefficiencies; changes in the company’s level of taxes, as well as audits, investigations and tax proceedings, or changes in tax laws or in their interpretation or enforcement, could have a material adverse effect on the company’s effective tax rate, results of operations, cash flows and financial condition; the company’s results of operations could be materially adversely affected by fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates; the company’s business could be materially adversely affected if the company incurs legal liability; the company’s work with government clients exposes the company to additional risks inherent in the government contracting environment; the company might not be successful at identifying, acquiring, investing in or integrating businesses, entering into joint ventures or divesting businesses; the company’s Global Delivery Network is increasingly concentrated in India and the Philippines, which may expose it to operational risks; as a result of the company’s geographically diverse operations and its growth strategy to continue geographic expansion, the company is more susceptible to certain risks; adverse changes to the company’s relationships with key alliance partners or in the business of its key alliance partners could adversely affect the company’s results of operations; the company’s services or solutions could infringe upon the intellectual property rights of others or the company might lose its ability to utilize the intellectual property of others; if the company is unable to protect its intellectual property rights from unauthorized use or infringement by third parties, its business could be adversely affected; the company’s ability to attract and retain business and employees may depend on its reputation in the marketplace; if the company is unable to manage the organizational challenges associated with its size, the company might be unable to achieve its business objectives; any changes to the estimates and assumptions that the company makes in connection with the preparation of its consolidated financial statements could adversely affect its financial results; many of the company’s contracts include payments that link some of its fees to the attainment of performance or business targets and/or require the company to meet specific service levels, which could increase the variability of the company’s revenues and impact its margins; the company’s results of operations and share price could be adversely affected if it is unable to maintain effective internal controls; the company may be subject to criticism and negative publicity related to its incorporation in Ireland; as well as the risks, uncertainties and other factors discussed under the “Risk Factors” heading in Accenture plc’s most recent annual report on Form 10-K and other documents filed with or furnished to the Securities and Exchange Commission. Statements in this news release speak only as of the date they were made, and Accenture undertakes no duty to update any forward-looking statements made in this news release or to conform such statements to actual results or changes in Accenture’s expectations.

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Contact:

Jens R. Derksen
Accenture Interactive
+ 49 175 57 61393
jens.derksen@accenture.com