Scale is king

Peraton’s purchase of Northrop Grumman’s (NYSE: NOC) IT services business and pending acquisition of Perspecta (NYSE: PRSP) are clearly aimed at obtaining the scale necessary to compete for large enterprise and digital transformation deals, which have become common in the public sector IT services market.

Peraton is hardly the first in this space to make such transformative purchases. SAIC (NYSE: SAIC) made two large acquisitions in two years with Engility and Unisys Federal in 2019 and 2020, respectively; General Dynamics IT (NYSE: GD) purchased CSRA in 2018; and Leidos (NYSE: LDOS) perhaps started the trend with its purchase of Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) Information Systems & Global Solutions (IS&GS) in 2016. As federal agencies seek to modernize and transform their operations to take advantage of emerging technologies such as cloud, 5G, AI, machine learning, and AR and VR, large monolithic deals, such as the Next Generation Enterprise Networks Recompete (NGEN-R), Defense Enterprise Office Solution (DEOS), Global Solutions Management – Operations II (GSM-O II) and Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI), among others, illustrate the importance of being able to deliver these technologies and surrounding services at scale.

Companies such as Leidos, General Dynamics Technologies (GDT) and Booz Allen Hamilton (NYSE: BAH) have come out as the clear winners on the vast majority of multibillion-dollar deals like the ones mentioned above, thanks largely to their ability to deliver digital transformation at scale and proven past performance. TBR believes this trend is only going to become more pervasive in 2021 as the federal government pursues continued IT modernization across defense, intelligence and civilian agencies. Alternatively, if the federal government begins to move toward smaller contracts in terms of total value and/or duration, Peraton’s newly acquired scale would no longer be an asset. However, this is likely only a long-term concern, as the federal government shows no signs of ramping down contract sizes or duration for the foreseeable future.  

Why Perspecta had to die

Perhaps nothing illustrates the importance of scale more than the death of Perspecta. When the company was formed from the merger of DXC Technology’s (NYSE: DXC) public sector business with Vencore and KeyPoint Government Solutions in 2018, the clear intention was to create a federally focused contractor of scale that could compete for the large transformative deals that have become commonplace. Most important among these was the NGEN-R contract, whose predecessor, the NGEN contract, was held by Perspecta and represented nearly 20% of the company’s total revenue.

Despite this, Perspecta was unable to win the $7.7 billion NGEN-R, which was awarded to Leidos and will begin to ramp up in 2H21, leaving Perspecta with a loss of 19% of its total revenue, which cannot be replaced quickly enough to avoid steep losses year-to-year.

Losing the NGEN-R bid put Perspecta in a very difficult place, beyond the obvious financial burden. The company’s leadership has fielded tough questions from Wall Street about where the company is headed without NGEN-R. Perspecta has been unable to win any comparable deals, such as DEOS or GSM-O II, on which it has bid in the last year or two. Additionally, the company does not have as strong of a portfolio in emerging technologies as many of its competitors, and it is highly unlikely Perspecta on its own could have returned to growth quickly enough to appease its stakeholders. In this context, it is clear that Perspecta needed to die. With its pending sale to Peraton, there is opportunity to reemerge as a more formidable competitor in the federal IT services market, free from the burdens associated with its past failures as part of Peraton.

On Jan. 27, Perspecta announced its purchase by Peraton, a Veritas Capital portfolio company, for an all-cash price of $7.1 billion. This acquisition comes on the heels of Peraton’s purchase of Northrop Grumman’s IT services business, which closed Feb. 1 (outlined in TBR’s special report End game for Northrop Grumman’s IT services business). The resulting company, which will retain the Peraton name, will be a $7.6 billion to $7.9 billion business on a pro forma basis with approximately 24,300 employees, in TBR’s estimates.

EY’s blockchain world

EY’s Asia-Pacific Blockchain Summit started with the firm’s Global Blockchain leader, Paul Brody, making three clear points. First, EY is committed to China and to the region, seeing huge potential for blockchain growth. Second, EY is committed to public blockchain as the long-term solution for most business and governments. Third, Brody’s concept of blockchain as the bridge between enterprises — as the tool to tackle the previously uncrossable chasm between different enterprises’ data and business processes — remains a driving force behind how EY sees the future of blockchain, in Asia and the rest of the world.

TBR’s December 2020 special report EY 2021: Hybrid and omnipresent discussed these latter two points: “Public blockchain, in Brody’s words, ‘will do for networks of enterprises and business ecosystems what ERP did for the single company.’ Brody added that conducting B2B [business-to-business] transactions over a public blockchain increases transparency and compliance with commercial terms.” The February event carried that discussion further, and specifically into Asia. 

EY and public blockchain in China  

Brody outlined a few major developments for EY in China, with all his comments reinforced by the subsequent panel speakers and EY professionals who provided additional color, both for the China-specific elements and developments impacting the entire region. In short:

• EY has formerly joined the Financial Blockchain Shenzhen Consortium (FISCO) and made the firm’s EY OpsChain solution available on the FISCO BCOS (Be Credible, Open & Secure) platform.
• EY intends to deploy its entire Ethereum suite of solutions to users in China.
• EY has fully localized its blockchain entrée — blockchain.ey.com — for the Chinese market.

In addition, Brody touched on the opportunity blockchain presents in Asia, highlighting China and the Chinese market’s emphasis on digital payments as a precursor to blockchain adoption as well as a robust startup scene. He also highlighted three sectors where EY has been “making exceptionally large” investments: financial services, supply chain and the public sector, which underscored one of Brody’s main points around the importance of public blockchain as the core, foundational building block. He noted that “money and stuff are tokens … contracts are a mix of legal agreements and business processes,” so all business could be conducted on the public blockchain, which is EY’s focus on enterprise solutions. 

On Feb. 2, EY hosted an Asia-Pacific Blockchain Summit, a virtual event run by the EY Blockchain practice based in Singapore that included EY professionals and clients, startup executives, and industry experts who are primarily, but not exclusively, based in Asia. The three-hour event included a keynote from EY Global Blockchain Leader Paul Brody, a blockchain solution demonstration, and panel discussions covering the technology, including the challenges and opportunities associated with blockchain and the broader emerging technology space. The following is TBR’s commentary on noteworthy announcements and participants’ assertions made during the event as well as EY’s overall blockchain strategy.

Government stimulus will accelerate 5G rollouts

An increasing number of governments worldwide are becoming directly and/or indirectly involved in ensuring new technologies, such as 5G, are widely deployed in their respective countries. This spend is, in many cases, tied to economic recovery packages to counter the impact of the COVID-19 crisis and is being justified based on economic, national security and public health grounds.

TBR’s research indicates governments worldwide will invest in excess of $2 trillion in the ICT sector over the next five years, starting in earnest in 2021. Of that $2 trillion, several hundred billion dollars will flow directly into the 5G market, primarily for the purposes of providing internet access to underserved and unserved people around the world as well as ensuring respective economies are able to transform to be relevant and competitive in the digital era.

China’s CSPs will maintain an accelerated 5G rollout in 2021; domestic vendors will be primary beneficiaries

Following the temporary shutdown associated with China’s initial battle with COVID-19 in 1Q20, China’s CSPs accelerated rollout of 5G RAN, deploying 700,000 5G base stations in 2020, in addition to the 100,000 base stations that were rolled out in 2019. China’s investment in 5G will remain elevated in 2021, with between 600,000 and 1,000,000 base stations set for deployment as the government makes 5G a centerpiece technology of its newest infrastructure development initiative.

These investments will primarily benefit China Communications Services (CCS), Huawei and ZTE, though Ericsson and smaller China-based vendor CICT are also taking part in 5G RAN builds. China’s government heavily influences CSPs’ contract allocation and prioritizes business for domestic firms. Huawei was allocated the bulk of business in the 5G cycle, increasing its share from the LTE cycle.

TBR believes China’s ICT ecosystem has sufficient chipsets to meet the country’s 5G RAN deployment targets in 2021, which suggests the supply chain encumbrances instituted by the U.S. government are not having a significant impact on China’s original deployment timelines.

The 5G Telecom Market Landscape includes key findings, market size, customer adoption, operator positioning and strategies, geographic adoption, vendor positioning and strategies, and acquisition and alliance strategies and opportunities.

In late 2020, KPMG’s blockchain team outlined to TBR the efforts the firm has made to evolve its blockchain practice, expanding into concrete and discrete areas in which the firm can “create an ecosystem around something that already exists, then add a layer of trust, enabled by blockchain,” as made evident by the three focus areas detailed by the KPMG team: cryptoasset custody and analytics, climate accounting infrastructure, and energy trading reconciliation. KPMG explained that the firm’s digital transformation initiatives, which underpin the entire blockchain practice, remain anchored by data, identity and ecosystem — conveniently core elements of blockchain. 

Americas Blockchain and Digital Assets Leader Arun Ghosh went one step further, saying KPMG had intentionally moved away from “leading with blockchain” to building a message around digitalization and trust: “Blockchain is digitizing the infrastructure. Fundamentally what blockchain does is digitize trust.” In TBR’s view, this business-problem-first, technology-second approach mirrors what consulting clients say they want and plays to KPMG’s strengths.

Measuring environmental commitments: Climate Accounting Infrastructure

Businesses face challenges in proving to clients, stakeholders and regulators that their efforts to address climate change have a measurable impact on the environment and meet enterprisewide goals. Stepping up to address that challenge, KPMG saw an opportunity to deploy blockchain solutions as part of a Climate Accounting Infrastructure (CAI) offering. In essence, verifiable emissions data depends on trust, which can best be built and sustained through a combination of tools, including blockchain solutions, AI, enhanced IoT sensors and cloud.

For KPMG, the journey to a blockchain-enabled climate accountability offering started with a client in the financial services sector that was seeking help to meet its sustainability goals. Operating across multiple regions, with overlapping and sometimes conflicting standards and regulations, the client wanted to invest smartly, prove value to its shareholders, and build trust with customers and regulators, all while fully understanding the costs and potential impacts, both positive and negative. Once KPMG devised a blockchain-enabled approach — which KPMG says provides “near real-time climate accounting and reporting to help clients meet their climate goals” — the firm narrowed its focus down to two core industries: real estate and oil & gas.

As Ghosh explained to TBR, these industries face increasing compliance pressures, as well as structural challenges to meeting environmental standards, making them excellent initial target clients. The specific blockchain component, according to KPMG, comes through securing the massive amounts of structured and unstructured data in a way that can be verified but not altered, leading to greater trust and transparency for all parties.

In a Dec. 29, 2020, article, The New York Times detailed the pressures facing the real estate industry in New York City, starting with the sheer volume of carbon emissions coming from the city’s buildings (close to 70% of the city’s total emissions). According to the article, a 2019 law “requires owners of structures 25,000 square feet or larger to make often sizable cuts in carbon emissions starting in 2024 or pay substantial fines” and “affects 50,000 of the city’s roughly one million buildings, including a substantial number of residential buildings.” The city’s role as a global financial hub and KPMG’s heritage in accounting and financial services present a strong opportunity for the firm to begin building a use case for its CAI offering, particularly if the firm leverages its existing NYC-based client relationships to gain introductions to commercial real estate owners.

Last fall, TBR met with KPMG’s blockchain leadership team, including Americas Blockchain and Digital Assets Leader Arun Ghosh, and discussed changes the company’s blockchain practice has undergone since the October 2019 Blockchain Analyst Day. As TBR prepares in 2021 to add a blockchain-specific component to our Digital Transformation portfolio, examining in detail how IT services vendors and consultancies have been building blockchain practices, we will publish special reports describing specific vendor offerings and how those offerings and supporting capabilities fit within the larger blockchain ecosystem.