Accenture to put millions into management services

Accenture plans to invest $100 million over the next three years to expand its information management services, the company announced Tuesday.

The investment is intended to extend existing information management offerings into a broader set of services, the company said. Currently, Accenture offers services including business intelligence, content management and performance management.

Royce Bell, previously a partner at Accenture, will head the information management group. The team will offer services designed to help clients manage, analyze and store data, text and other information to improve decision-making and overall performance.

"Our clients are grappling with 'information overload,'" Bell said in a statement. "To manage their businesses, interact with customers and make financial and operational decisions more efficiently and effectively, they must be able to maximize the use of all the data and content at their disposal."

Quoting research data, Accenture said the market for information management services is growing at about 9 percent annually and is estimated to be worth $27 billion by 2007.

The consulting and outsourcing giant recently announced plans to hire 30,000 workers in Asia, even as rivals such as Hewlett-Packard have announced job cuts, including layoffs in the services segment.