TLDR:
- Accenture forms new Nvidia business group focused on agentic AI adoption
- Partnership aims to help clients rapidly scale AI implementation
- 30,000+ Nvidia-trained AI practitioners to support the initiative
- New AI Refinery Engineering Hubs to be added in multiple global locations
- Accenture stock rises following partnership announcement
Accenture and Nvidia have announced an expansion of their partnership, forming a new Nvidia business group within Accenture focused on helping enterprises rapidly scale their artificial intelligence adoption.
This collaboration comes at a time when businesses are eager to harness the power of AI but face challenges in implementation and scaling.
The new business group will leverage Accenture’s AI Refinery platform, which is built on Nvidia’s AI stack, including Nvidia AI Foundry, Nvidia AI Enterprise, and Nvidia Omniverse.
This integrated approach aims to provide clients with a solid foundation for implementing agentic AI, a more advanced form of AI that can autonomously perform tasks and make decisions within set parameters.
Lan Guan, Accenture’s chief AI officer, highlighted the growing demand for AI solutions, revealing that generative AI-related projects drove $3 billion in Accenture bookings during their recently closed fiscal year.
However, Guan noted that only about 10% of companies have fully scaled their generative AI initiatives, citing challenges such as cost, complexity, technical debt, data issues, and talent readiness.
To address these hurdles, Accenture is mobilizing a workforce of over 30,000 Nvidia-trained AI practitioners. These experts will be instrumental in helping clients reinvent processes and scale enterprise AI adoption.
The AI Refinery platform will be available across public and private cloud platforms, integrating seamlessly with other Accenture business groups to ensure comprehensive support.
As part of this initiative, Accenture is introducing a new Nvidia NIM Agent Blueprint for virtual facility robot fleet simulation. This blueprint combines Nvidia’s Omniverse, Isaac, and Metropolis software to assist industrial companies in building autonomous, robot-operated software-defined factories and facilities.
Accenture plans to implement these capabilities at Eclipse Automation, its manufacturing automation company, projecting up to 50% faster designs and a 30% reduction in cycle time for clients.
The partnership extends beyond industrial applications, with Accenture’s marketing function integrating the AI Refinery platform to streamline campaign creation and execution. Early estimates suggest this integration could reduce manual steps by up to 35%, cut costs by 6%, and increase speed-to-market by up to 55%.
To further support this ambitious AI initiative, Accenture is establishing new AI Refinery Engineering Hubs in Singapore, Tokyo, Malaga, and London.
These hubs, part of Accenture’s Center for Advanced AI, will focus on the selection, fine-tuning, and large-scale inferencing of foundation models, providing deep engineering skills and technical capacity for agentic AI systems.
The announcement of this partnership has been well-received by investors, with Accenture’s stock price rising 1.22% to close at $356.29 on October 2, 2024. The positive market reaction reflects confidence in Accenture’s strategic move to position itself at the forefront of enterprise AI adoption.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang emphasized the importance of this collaboration, describing Accenture as the “connecting fabric” between Nvidia’s technology and customers.
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