NEW YORK; April 13, 2016 – Accenture (NYSE: ACN), Avanade and Microsoft have been chosen by RCS MediaGroup to accelerate the company’s path of growth and transformation using the cloud. The project will help RCS to address challenges such as how to obtain the most from content and data as well as how to get to know and retain its customers. RCS MediaGroup, one of the major international multimedia publishing groups, publishes newspapers, magazines and numerous other multimedia products.

Accenture, leading Microsoft services firm Avanade and Microsoft will work together to offer RCS a high performance cloud solution leveraging the Accenture Hybrid Cloud Solution for Microsoft Azure and the Accenture Cloud Platform. This co-engineered solution will enable RCS to exploit the potential of cloud to facilitate more seamless, flexible and economical operations for their applications. For example, RCS will be able to automate, simplify and accelerate distribution of digital content to readers, address online reader preferences more effectively and expand digital publishing offerings.

Accenture will provide RCS MediaGroup with program governance and infrastructure consulting services, applications and infrastructure migration expertise and cloud management capabilities of the Accenture Cloud Platform. Avanade will provide Microsoft cloud technical guidance and applications together with infrastructure migration experience. Microsoft will contribute its cloud technology Azure.

“The transition to digital continues to create significant disruption to the publishing industry,” said Francesco Venturini, global managing director for Accenture’s Media and Entertainment Group. “This is a remarkable commitment by RCS MediaGroup to digital publishing that capitalizes on the versatile Accenture, Avanade and Microsoft capabilities. Accenture welcomes the opportunity to team with this innovative and well-established publisher as it reshapes, enhances and accelerates new capabilities and services for its readers.”

“This program is fully aligned with Accenture’s Cloud First strategic agenda using the flexibility and automation capabilities of the Accenture Cloud Platform,” Venturini added. “On a larger scale than ever, digital publishing and many other forms of media and entertainment are pursuing cloud computing focused on outcomes such as lower cost and more agile digital publishing consumption.”

“Avanade is enthusiastic about this new ambitious collaboration with RCS MediaGroup to create a cloud strategy in such an integrated way. We are confident this strategic partnership will help RCS gain competitive market advantage using the flexibility and security benefits the Hybrid Cloud offers,” said Danilo Boretto, Italy and Europe Business Lead for Communication, Media and Technology at Avanade.

“We are proud to collaborate with Accenture and Avanade to further support one of the major publishing group in the Country, by offering all the flexibility and security of our Azure cloud platform, powering interoperability through the majority of Open Source platforms, as witnessed by this project that made WordPress available on Azure. We’re confident this project will deliver real impact innovation and contribute in offering RCS MediaGroup with a competitive edge to keep up with this new information and entertainment environment we’re living in,” explained Tiziana Olivieri, Enterprise & Partner Group Lead at Microsoft Italy.

“The adoption of the "Cloud paradigm" in all its forms becomes a decisive lever to pursue our growth objectives, particularly in the digital area," said Umberto Tonelli, CIO of RCS MediaGroup. “For the technological infrastructure, we aim to migrate to the public cloud for all major platforms of the Group within three years, with the aim of achieving greater flexibility and scalability and a lower total cost of ownership compared to the current on-premise management. The collaboration with Accenture, Avanade and Microsoft, that combines the flexibility of the Microsoft Azure cloud and governance of the Accenture Cloud Platform, will allow us to accelerate productivity and digital distribution of more innovative and valuable content to our readers.”

The Accenture Cloud Platform, the multi-cloud management platform that powers the Accenture Hybrid Cloud Platform for Microsoft Azure, enables organizations to centrally manage all of their enterprise cloud resources – public and private – and automate and accelerate the delivery of cloud solutions. An open, scalable technical cloud platform, it allows services to be ramped up or down as needed. The platform manages and integrates with technology from leading global cloud providers such as Microsoft.

About Avanade

Avanade leads in providing innovative digital services, business solutions and design-led experiences for its clients, delivered through the power of people and the Microsoft ecosystem. Our professionals combine technology, business and industry expertise to build and deploy solutions to realize results for clients and their customers. Avanade has 28,000 digitally connected people across 23 countries, bringing clients the best thinking through a collaborative culture that honors diversity and reflects the communities in which we operate. Majority owned by Accenture, Avanade was founded in 2000 by Accenture LLP and Microsoft Corporation.