IBM Bolstering Hybrid Cloud, AI Skills, Capabilities with Dialexa Acquisition

IBM is acquiring Dialexa, a U.S. digital product engineering services firm. Dialexa will join IBM Consulting, spearheading IBM’s digital product engineering services presence in the Americas.

Dialexa will be the sixth acquisition IBM has made this year. It will further strengthen IBM’s hybrid cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) skills and capabilities.

Since Arvind Krishna became CEO in April 2020, IBM has acquired more than 25 companies. Of those, 13 acquisitions, including Dialexa, have been in IBM Consulting. Among those are Neudesic, Sentaca, Nordcloud and Tao.

The transaction should close in the fourth quarter of this year. It’s subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory clearances. IBM didn’t say how much it’s paying for Dialexa.

Acquisition Provides Opportunities for IBM Partners, Dialexa

Paul Papas is managing partner of IBM Consulting Americas.

IBM’s Paul Papas

“The acquisition will allow Dialexa to gain access to IBM’s broad ecosystem, provide an opportunity to collaborate with our network of partners and leverage our joint strengths to solve complex, technical problems for clients,” he said. “It is also an opportunity for our partners, working hand in hand with our digital product engineering services team, to co-create and build scalable products that drive innovation for clients.”

The product engineering services market is rapidly growing, Papas said. It’s a high-growth market opportunity that analysts expect to reach $700 billion by 2026.

“This is a critical focus area for IBM Consulting,” he said. “With this acquisition, IBM is deepening our product engineering expertise and expanding our footprint in the space to strengthen our capabilities to deliver digital transformation services to our clients. We are growing the portfolio of work we are delivering around digital design and IT integration, coupled with the engineering services that Dialexa provides, providing our clients a full range of expertise and capabilities at their disposal.”

As they look to thrive in an increasingly digital world, IBM’s clients are turning to digital product engineering service providers to create new opportunities for building digital products that generate new revenue streams, add services and enhance employee productivity, Papas said.

“This acquisition will strengthen our ability to meet the evolving design, strategy and execution needs of our clients and provide end-to-end digital transformation,” he said. “Additionally, we have the ability to leverage our trusted partners, integrating partner technologies into customer and employee-facing products that will drive better business outcomes for our clients.”

Continuing Investments in Hybrid Cloud, AI Capabilities, Services

IBM continues to invest in hybrid cloud and AI capabilities and services, Pappas said. Clients are seeking these across IBM Consulting and IBM Software.

“And as you’ve seen, we’ve significantly invested in our ecosystem,” he said. “In fact, many of the acquisitions we’ve announced increased our expertise in different partner technology and platforms, such as Neudesic in Microsoft Azure, 7Summits in Salesforce, Taos for AWS and Microsoft Azure, and more.”

Scott Harper is Dialexa’s CEO and co-founder.

“Digital product engineering represents the tip of the spear for competitive advantage,” he said. “IBM and Dialexa’s shared vision for delivering industry-defining digital products could be a game changer.”