CGI acquires IT consulting firm Facilité Informatique

Continuing its healthy appetite for mergers and acquisitions, leading Canadian IT consulting firm CGI has acquired Facilité Informatique – an IT consulting specialist with offices in Canada, the US, and France. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

CGI, one of the world’s largest IT consulting firms, has acquired Facilité Informatique, a smaller IT consultancy with a strong local presence in the Francophone/bilingual centres of Montreal, Ottawa, and Quebec City. The firm also has offices in Paris and Boston.

For more than 25 years, Facilité Informatique has provided information technology advisory services to a wide array of industry clients, ranging from government and manufacturing to finance. The 350-person firm has deep expertise in advising on IT strategy and architecture, IT risk and security, business intelligence, web and mobile app development, and ‘agile’ methodology implementation. Buzzworthy ‘agile’ project management – which divides tasks into short phases of work while frequently redesigning plans – is a particular strength of Facilité Informatique, which boasts its own ‘Centre of Excellence’ for agile development.

The addition of the smaller firm will further strengthen Montreal-based CGI’s IT consulting footprint and capabilities in its home country. CGI has been providing IT consulting services for more than forty years, and has over 80 offices and about 11,000 employees in Canada. Worldwide, the firm employs 73,000 people and has over 400 locations.

"This merger builds on our foundation of strong capabilities in Montréal and Québec City, specifically expanding our business and technology consulting expertise, which will help our clients deliver their transformation agendas," remarked Mark Boyajian, President of CGI's Canadian operations. We warmly welcome our new colleagues, and we look forward to introducing CGI's end-to-end service and solution portfolio to Facilité Informatique clients."

Last year, CGI made multiple strategic consultancy acquisitions in the US – including the purchase of Pittsburgh-based Summa Technologies. With a large backlog of orders (exceeding $20 billion in 2017), CGI is eager to expand its ability to answer the strong and growing client demand for its digital and IT services. The consultancy aims to do this via both organic and inorganic growth, while also situating itself geographically closer to its numerous clients.

"This transaction is consistent with our Build and Buy strategy," commented CGI President and CEO George D. Schindler. "Canada continues to be a strategic operation for CGI and Facilité Informatique represents another important step in advancing CGI's client proximity model, deepening our expertise and expanding our capabilities."

Last month, CGI released its Q2 fiscal 2018 results. The publicly-traded company reported quarterly revenues of $3.0 billion, up 8.3% year-over-year.