Capgemini to buy WNS for $3.3 bn in AI boost

French information technology (IT) and consulting services major Capgemini on Monday said it would acquire Mumbai-headquartered WNS for $3.3 billion in cash.

- AVIK DAS

This could be one of the largest merger & acquisition deals in the IT services and business process management sector.

Capgemini is valuing the NYSE-listed WNS at $76.50 per share, a 28 per cent premium to its 90-day average share price. The acquisition, according to Capgemini, aims to address the strategic opportunity created by agentic artificial intelligence (AI).

"The acquisition of WNS will provide the scale and vertical sector expertise to capture the rapidly emerging strategic opportunity created by the paradigm shift from traditional business process services to agentic AI-powered intelligent operations," Capgemini Chief Executive Officer Aiman Ezzat said in a statement.

Industry experts and insiders agreed that the acquisition would give Capgemini an edge in the fast-evolving field of agentic AI. It is also expected to boost the French firm's top line, which has been trailing behind its peers'. This is not the first large acquisition by Capgemini. In 2015, the firm had acquired iGate for $4 billion.

Capgemini expects the WNS acquisition to help in two key aspects. First, it will be revenue-accretive immediately, at a time when the company has reported muted growth for two consecutive years. Second, it will provide industry-specific process expertise and access to WNS' large portfolio of legacy business process outsourcing (BPO) deals that enterprises want to convert into services-as-software.