Dachis Group Buys XPlane

Dachis Group, a business advisory acquisition platform sponsored by Austin Ventures, has acquired Xplane Corp., a Portland, Ore.-based information design consultancy. No financial terms were disclosed.

PRESS RELEASE

Dachis Group announced today the acquisition of Portland, Oregon based XPLANE Corporation, continuing the growth of the international firm with offices servicing clients in the North American, European and Asia/Pacific regions.

As one of the world’s leading information design consultancies, the acquisition of XPLANE strengthens Dachis Group’s position as the world leader in Social Business Design. XPLANE brings critical process design and change communications capabilities to the group.

“This is an exciting step in XPLANE’s evolution,” said Dave Gray, Founder of XPLANE. “Social Business Design is the future of business transformation. Dachis Group is the clear leader in the field and the perfect partner to move forward with.”

“Both Dachis Group and XPLANE are designing the consultancy of the future by leveraging design thinking, social media, and technology to drive breakthrough results for large global clients,” said Aric Wood, Chief Executive Officer of XPLANE. “The opportunity for us to join together creates a world-class firm with global scale and a truly innovative offering.”

The combined company will be able to better serve a global client base with over 100 professionals in seven cities in five countries worldwide.

“I’m eager to add XPLANE’s process design and change management acumen to Dachis Group’s strategy and implementation capabilities,” said Peter Kim, Managing Director of Dachis Group’s North American operations. “Our clients now have access to a full set of Social Business advisory services unmatched by any other business consultancy.”

“The future of global business is in a more connected, network-centric organizational model. With XPLANE, Dachis Group is better able to map our client’s complex processes and information flows and design more effective programs for organizational transformation,” said Jeffrey Dachis, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Dachis Group. “We are fortunate to be able to team up with Dave Gray, Aric Wood and their extremely talented group to better service our global client base.”

Jeffrey Dachis will assume the title of Chairman of XPLANE and Aric Wood will maintain the role of Chief Executive Officer of XPLANE reporting to Jeffrey Dachis, Chief Executive Officer of Dachis Group. Dave Gray will serve as Founder and Consulting Leader for XPLANE.

About XPLANE
Founded in 1993 by Dave Gray, XPLANE is an information design consultancy that drives results for many of the world’s leading corporations by clarifying complex business process and communication problems through visual thinking and information design.

Companies have hired XPLANE to drive process innovation, motivate employees, drive sales, and convince decision makers.

At the highest level, XPLANE provides two core services: facilitative consulting to help clients unlock and synthesize critical information into clear strategies using visual thinking methodologies, and multidisciplinary design services that create change communication tools, communicating information with the effectiveness to drive breakthrough results.

XPLANE’S approach accelerates organizational understanding, which drives actions and results. Companies turn to XPLANE to define the current state, envision the desired future state, and develop a roadmap to drive the identified programmatic improvements to overcome organizational hurdles and build momentum for change.

XPLANE serves the world’s leading organizations with over 40 of the FORTUNE 500 and numerous government agencies including Microsoft, Intel, ITT, U.S. Marine Corps, Shell, Royal Mail Group, Bank of England, Hewlett Packard, BP, SunGard and Nokia.

About Dachis Group
Dachis Group has developed a framework for Social Business Design by addressing organizational change across business systems, process, and culture.

Dachis Group provides professional management consulting and advisory services, process design, program management, information design, marketing, change communication, and technical implementation services across three main practice areas: Customer Participation and Engagement, Workforce Collaboration, and Business Partner Optimization.

Dachis Group serves global companies including: Alcatel, AXA, BP, Best Buy, British Airways, Citigroup, Coca-Cola, DeVry University, Intuit, Southern Company and Yum! Brands.

Dachis Group (Dachis Corporation, Inc.) was created to unlock the value of social technologies for large corporate enterprises. Founded in 2008, by Jeffrey Dachis, Dachis Group services companies all around the globe with offices in seven cities in five countries. Dachis Group is headquartered in Austin, Texas with offices in Portland, Oregon, St. Louis, Missouri, London, England, Sydney, Australia, Amsterdam, Netherlands, and Madrid, Spain. Dachis Group operates as Dachis Group, Headshift, part of the Dachis Group, The 2.0 Adoption Council, part of the Dachis Group and XPLANE, part of the Dachis Group.

The company’s strategy is backed by a commitment from Austin Ventures to build and grow organically and through acquisitions.

If you are interested in finding out how Dachis Group can help your business, contact: inquiries@dachisgroup.com.