Accenture to Acquire Vocatus, Expanding Its Capabilities in Behavioral Pricing Strategies

Accenture has entered into an agreement to acquire management consultancy Vocatus, which uses behavioral economics modeling to develop pricing strategies and sales concepts for business-to-business and business-to-consumer models. The terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

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“Accenture’s scale and global presence open up exciting new perspectives for our team members and clients. Together, we can take behavioral pricing and selling to a new level in a number of industries and o**** companies holistic solutions for strategic pricing, as well as tactical price execution.”

With the acquisition of Vocatus, Accenture expands its offerings for clients in Europe with greater modeling capabilities for identifying price levels and sales optimization, differentiating from competitors and communicating with customers – using behavioral economics effects to predict decision-making and align incentive systems.

Headquartered in Munich, Vocatus and its more than 50 experts will join Accenture’s Corporate Strategy, Growth and Pricing division. For nearly 25 years, the company has been supporting businesses in sectors like financial services, media and telecommunications. Vocatus developed a proprietary, comprehensive method in-house, called GRIPS, to identify purchasing behavior and buyer types for specific markets. The method has been verified in over 500 qualitative and quantitative studies for clients across 30 countries since 2008.

“Vocatus brings a differentiated approach to behavior-based pricing that will help our clients gain a competitive edge and improve their market position. The acquisition complements our offerings in implementing growth and efficiency strategies with a view toward pricing and sales optimization,” said Johannes Trenka, Accenture’s strategy, growth and pricing lead in Europe.

Christina Raab, market unit lead of Accenture in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, added: “Business and customer needs and requirements are prone to change – especially in volatile times. With their in-depth knowledge, Vocatus will expand our pricing strategies and modeling, support our clients in modernizing their sales operation and ultimately help boost profitability. Together, we can help companies build resilience and remain competitive for the long term, reinventing their business models in order to keep pace with disruption.”

Prof. Florian Bauer, member of the executive board of Vocatus, explained: “Accenture’s scale and global presence open up exciting new perspectives for our team members and clients. Together, we can take behavioral pricing and selling to a new level in a number of industries and o**** companies holistic solutions for strategic pricing, as well as tactical price execution.”

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