IBM to Acquire Kenexa, Bolster Social Business Initiatives

IBM has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Kenexa at a net price of approximately $1.3 billion.

The acquisition bolsters IBM's leadership in helping clients embrace social business capabilities while gaining actionable insights from the enormous streams of information generated from social networks every day.

With Kenexa's front-office process solutions, IBM will be able to offer strategic consulting, a social technology platform, and expertise on a global scale to help clients enable a smarter workforce and gain a competitive advantage in any market.

"IBM is uniquely positioned to help clients generate real returns from their social business investments, while helping them gain intelligence into the data being generated in these networks to be more competitive in their markets,"said Alistair Rennie, general manager, social business, IBM.

"The customer is the big winner in all this because the combination of our two organizations will deliver more business outcomes than ever before," said Rudy Karsan, chief executive officer, Kenexa.

The adoption of social business technology is supporting the growth of big data and the need for analytics in the enterprise. The Kenexa acquisition will complement IBM's social business and HR business services leadership.

IBM plans to continue to support Kenexa clients and enhance Kenexa technologies while allowing these organizations to take advantage of the broader IBM portfolio.

IBM expects the transaction to close in the fourth quarter of 2012, subject to Kenexa shareholder and regulatory approvals and the satisfaction of other customary closing conditions.