Keane unit targets Web businesses
The computer services firm's new consulting group, a combination of two past acquisitions, will focus on helping companies build Internet businesses.
The newly formed Keane Consulting Group is a combination of past acquisitions Bricker & Associates, a business innovation consulting group, and Amherst Consulting, a strategy consulting group. With the new group, Boston-based Keane is aiming to round out the firm's services, which help customers build Internet businesses and e-commerce sites.
The move follows Keane's recent formation of a new business unit, Keane Interactive, which aims to provide clients with Web design, Web development, and the delivery and management of Web-based products such as e-commerce capabilities and interactive advertising.
Like its rivals EDS, CSC and Big Five management consulting firms Andersen Consulting and KPMG, Keane has been busy bolstering its consulting practices in an effort to grab more Internet and e-commerce projects and move away from traditional back-office implementations and consulting work. The firm has been faced with stiff competition from smaller, more nimble Internet consulting firms, such as Scient, Proxicom, Lante and Viant, as more and more companies continue to revamp their existing Web strategies or move their businesses online.
Keane, a $1 billion firm, said its new consulting unit will help companies take traditional businesses online, as well as help them build long-term Web strategies.