Accenture beats quarterly revenue estimates on strong demand for genAI services

(Reuters) – IT service provider Accenture (NYSE:) beat Wall Street estimates for first-quarter revenue on Thursday, on the back of growing demand for its services to help clients adopt AI-powered tools.

Shares of the company rose 5% in premarket trading.

Businesses are investing heavily to scale their AI projects and digitize their core operations to boost efficiency and cut costs, which is helping companies such as Accenture.

The company’s new bookings rose to $18.7 billion for the first quarter from $18.4 billion a year earlier.

Ahead of the results, analysts said tech budgets for fiscal year 2025 will likely improve which bodes well for IT service providers such as Accenture and EPAM.

Accenture’s GenerativeAI business recorded new bookings of $1.2 billion, whereas its consulting and outsourcing segments reported $9.2 billion and $9.5 billion, respectively.

Its first-quarter revenue stood at $17.7 billion, beating analysts’ estimates of $17.12 billion, according to data compiled by LSEG.

The company expects annual revenue to grow between 4% and 7%, compared with analysts’ expectations of 5.63%. It had earlier forecast growth of 3%-6%.

Accenture forecast second-quarter revenue of $16.2 billion to $16.8 billion, the mid-point of which is below analysts’ average estimate of $16.63 billion.