Unilever has signed a multi-million pound seven-year
contract with Accenture to provide IT application development,
implementation and support for Unilever across Europe.
The contract is part of Unilever’s 'One Unilever' program, which
is designed to deliver annual savings of €700m (£500m) through the
implementation of a unified and streamlined operating model for the
company.
The deal builds on an existing relationship between the two
companies under which Accenture had been providing business
consulting and IT services to Unilever for more than 10 years.
The Accenture agreement follows an outsourcing contract that
Unilever recently signed with IBM to provide procurement and
payment management systems.
The Accenture contract covers the provision of IT services to
Unilever’s operations in 25 European countries, with the services
company deploying a unified European IT platform.
Accenture said it expects to deliver the services from six
countries: the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, France, Spain and
Hungary.
Unilever chief information officer Neil Cameron, said, “This
deal allows us to create a simpler, more agile European IT function
to better support Unilever’s growth agenda.”
Unilever said a number of it IT staff will transfer to Accenture
as part of the deal. It is currently talking to staff
representatives about these transfers.
Unilever, which own brands including Persil, Flora and Marmite,
is currently training 10,000 staff to use a new SAP business
processing system being rolled out across the company.