First Take: HP Acquires Autonomy

On August 18th, 2011 HP announced some changes to their business – including the acquisition of Autonomy.

I was curious as to how this could affect the CRM and Customer Service markets, where a number of vendors have deals with either Autonomy or Verity to OEM their search engine.  I asked the questions, had the conversations, and concluded that there is no short-term or mid-term effect for CRM and Customer Service, as Autonomy will continue as an independent entity.

On August 18th, 2011 HP announced some changes to their business – including the acquisition of Autonomy.

I was curious as to how this could affect the CRM and Customer Service markets, where a number of vendors have deals with either Autonomy or Verity to OEM their search engine.  I asked the questions, had the conversations, and concluded that there is no short-term or mid-term effect for CRM and Customer Service, as Autonomy will continue as an independent entity.

However, there is a far more interesting play here where HP provides Autonomy resources (mostly money, but also market presence and relationships as well as a consulting arm) and Autonomy can begin to leverage their many acquisitions and technologies into addressing the need for new knowledge paradigms (which I introduced when discussing the Oracle-Inquira deal).

I have prepared an event note for thinkJar customers and few others that discusses these points in more detail.  Please contact me if you have not received it or would like to talk more about this deal and the market realities.

Further Reading

Dennis Howlett wrote a very good analysis

Phil Fersht from Horses for Source has a very good take on their plans

Colleen Taylor at Giga Om had an interesting analysis as well

Dave Kellogg covered the early rumors quite well

Reuters had an interesting take on the data dilemma and its solution