CGI
Ms. Julie Godin (Co-Chair of the Board and Exec. VP of Strategic Planning & Corp. Devel.)
Mr. George D. Schindler (Pres, CEO & Director)
Summary
CGI Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides information technology (IT) and business process services in Canada; Western, Southern, Central, and Eastern Europe; Australia; Scandinavia; Finland, Poland, and Baltics; the United States; the United Kingdom; and the Asia Pacific. Its services include the management of IT and business outsourcing, systems integration and consulting, and software solutions selling activities. The company also offers application development, integration and maintenance, testing, portfolio management, and modernization services; business consulting; and a suite of business process services designed to address the needs of specific industries, as well as IT infrastructure services. It serves clients operating in government, banking and capital market, health, utility, communication and media, oil and gas, retail, consumer and services, space, manufacturing, insurance, life sciences, retail and consumer service, and transportation and logistics sectors. The company was formerly known as CGI Group Inc. and changed its name to CGI Inc. in January 2019. CGI Inc. was founded in 1976 and is headquartered in Montreal, Canada.
History
CGI Inc. was founded as an IT consulting company on June 15, 1976, in Quebec City, Québec, by Serge Godin. Within several months he was joined by co-founder André Imbeau from Quebec City. They initially ran the business from Godin's basement with a single phone. Starting with one client, as the company grew in size the co-founders moved to Montreal, and by the end of their first year they had generated $138,000 in revenue. While CGI stands for "Conseillers en gestion et informatique" in French , the official English meaning would become "Consultants to Government and Industry." In later years the company began to go to market as simply CGI.Throughout the 1970s CGI grew in size and continued to focus on the information technology services market, soon offering systems integration alongside consulting. Near the end of the 1970s, however, the systems integration market began to shift to outsourcing, with CGI responding by branching into IT outsourcing as well. The company also secured a number of government contracts, and the UK Ministry of Defence brought in CGI around 1980 to act as a systems integrator, among other roles. CGI's annual revenue in 1986 was $25 million, and that year the company began acquiring a number of smaller IT services companies. CGI went public with an initial public offering to fund the acquisitions, and by the late 1980s CGI was expanding further, acquiring several business processes services companies and expanding beyond Canada.
The CGI Management Foundation was formed in 1992 to manage CGI's "management frameworks, policies and guidelines." CGI earned ISO 9001 certification for their "project management framework" in 1994, and in doing so became the first IT consulting firm in North America to comply with the ISO quality standard. A year later CGI's AMICUS library management software was first developed in collaboration with the National Library of Canada, and in 1997 a customized version was commissioned by the British Library. By the mid-1990s CGI had a client base both in Canada and internationally, and was establishing the company's long-term "build and buy" growth strategy. In 1995 CGI entered into a commercial alliance with the large telecommunications company Bell Canada, with Bell Canada purchasing CGI shares then valued at $18.4 million. By the end of 1996, CGI's annual revenue was $122 million.In April 1997, CGI acquired the company CDSL Holdings Limited for a purchase price of about $36.5 million. At the time CDSL was Canada's largest "independent provider of retail banking services and electronic commerce/switching services," and largely serviced the credit union industry in Canada. After the acquisition, CGI's employees in both Canada and internationally numbered 2,500. After various commercial relationships with Interac since the mid-1980s, in 1997 CGI became the first non-financial company in Canada to enable Interac money transfers for clients. In 1998 CGI acquired the Canadian company Bell Sygma, a Bell Canada subsidiary, which almost doubled CGI's size. The deal was one of the largest Canadian outsourcing contracts of the time.
By 2000 CGI had clients in the banking industry. CGI acquired the company IMRGlobal in 2001 for $438 million, which added "global delivery options" for CGI.After almost doubling in size with the 1998 acquisition of Bell Sygma, CGI acquired IMRGlobal in 2001 for $438 million, which added "global delivery options" for CGI. Other significant purchases include American Management Systems for $858 million in 2004,In January 2003, the Canadian tech company Cognicase was bought out by CGI for US$221 million, and at the end of 2003 CGI had annual sales of $1.85 billion. In May 2004, CGI purchased the majority of American Management Systems for $858 million, acquiring the commercial divisions and all government business not related to national defense. The acquisition grew CGI's presence in the United States, Europe and Australia and led to the formation of the CGI Federal division. The defense and intelligence practice divisions were sold to CACI for $415 million. As of late 2004, CGI was the world's eighth-largest independent provider of information technology services.CGI co-founder Serge Godin stepped aside as CEO in 2006, taking the new position of executive chairman of the board and appointing as new CEO Michael Roach, who quickly focused on further company expansion. Annual revenue at CGI was $3.5 billion by the fiscal end of 2006. That same year, CGI became one of four primary Recovery Audit Contractors in the US, with responsibilities to audit region B. At the end of 2007, CGI had a backlog worth $12.04 billion and an annual revenue of $3.7 billion, employing around 26,500 people. Continuing to develop SaaS products, in 2008 CGI's AMS Advantage ERP system won a Best of Kentucky Award for its use by the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
In August 2010, CGI Federal acquired Stanley, Inc. for an enterprise value of approximately $1.07 billion. The deal came close to doubling CGI's presence in the United States and expanded CGI into defense and intelligence contracts. Several years earlier, CGI had been legally unable to acquire AMS's defense division because of a lack of U.S. Department of Defense-required infrastructure. In 2010, however, the infrastructure was in place. At the time of merger, Stanley earned annual revenues of $865 million, and that amount, combined with CGI Federal's profit, brought their joint income to about $1.2 billion. In 2010, CGI was included in the Forbes Global 2000 ranking of the 2,000 largest public companies in the world. As of 2011, there were 31,000 CGI employees in 125 offices worldwide and 89% of professionals at CGI also owned company shares. That fall, the EPA awarded CGI Federal a "$207 million task order renewal over a six year period to support the EPA's Central Data Exchange ."
In August 2012, CGI acquired the UK-based computer services company Logica for £1.7 billion in cash. The acquisition raised the number of CGI's staff from 31,000 to 68,000, and CGI became the fifth largest independent business processes and IT services company in the world, with clients in the Americas, Asia, and Europe. It also made CGI the biggest tech firm in Canada.In September 2012, CGI Federal won a $143 million contract to provide operational support for the Army's training elements, the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence, and the United States Army Training and Doctrine Command. Also that September, it was announced that CGI Federal's "health and compliance programs business unit" had been given the highest rating possible by the Software Engineering Institute. In doing so, CGI Federal became the tenth company in the United States to receive the Level 5 rating for CMMI Development. At this point CGI was working on a number of successful health-related projects, largely in North America. However, in 2012 CGI had its $46.2-million contract to build an electronic diabetes registry for eHealth Ontario formally cancelled after it failed to meet deadlines imposed by eHealth. The work that CGI did would later be declared obsolete, and it was overtaken by more recent technology developed by other contractors.
In 2013, CGI won a significant contract to provide cloud computing services to the UK government, and that April, CGI began working with CIFAS on a modernized platform to visualize and analyse data from the National Fraud Database. At the time, CGI's train occupancy mobile app, iNStAPP, was being used by several train companies and institutions in Europe. In February 2013, the independent analyst firm Verdantix published a report comparing technology consulting and systems integration firms' ability to build efficient renewable energy management systems. The report named CGI as No. 4 on the "overall capabilities" score. Continuing to work in the financial sector, CGI was rated as a "major contender" by Everest Group in a 2013 PEAK Matrix study looking at IT outsourcing capital markets.In 2011 CGI Federal was one of several dozen contractors selected by the United States Department of Health and Human Services to establish a new federal health insurance marketplace. Delays in the two-year development process attracted widespread coverage in the media, and following the public launch of HealthCare.gov on October 1, 2013, technical issues surfaced which prevented many users from logging in. As one of primary contractors involved, CGI Federal's contributions were scrutinized by the press and policy makers, though the Lexington Institute later concluded that "many of the early problems with part of the project were traceable to a front-end feature assembled by a different contractor for which CGI wasn't responsible." CGI was also contracted to help develop health insurance marketplaces for a number of state governments. Some, like the websites for Colorado and Kentucky were launched smoothly, while the websites for Vermont, Massachusetts, and Hawaii Health Connector experienced difficulties. By the December 2013 deadline the problems had largely been fixed, and within several weeks enrollment in the federal marketplace was at 1.1 million people. Analysis of the situation by journalists, government officials, and think tanks has varied. Despite the press scrutiny over HealthCare.gov, in late 2013 and early 2014 the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services awarded CGI a value of $37 million in various contracts. However, the agency did not renew CGI Federal's contract for HealthCare.gov when it ended in February 2014, citing that the firm was ineffective at fixing the website's problems. According to CGI, the agreement was mutual.
As of 2016, CGI ranked No. 955 on the Forbes Forbes Global 2000. At the time CGI had assets worth C$20.9 billion, annual sales of $10.7 billion, and a market value of $9.6 billion. In 2014, CGI claimed an "$8 billion pipeline of future task orders—doubling its federal business over the period of a year." Among these contracts were $871 million with the Defense Information Services Agency, $143 million for visa processing in China, and an "indefinite quantity" contract for the Coast Guard and Department of Homeland Security. CGI also continued to work with state governments, for example signing a $399 million contract to work on the California Enterprise Data to Revenue Project for the California Franchise Tax Board. In October 2014, The Globe and Mail reported that CGI was operating ten security centers, from which 1,400 CGI employees monitor "data traffic for an undisclosed number of customers" that include the Canadian Payments Association, the National Bank of Canada, and about forty Canadian government departments.By 2014, CGI had been working with the European space industry for years, and had developed software that helps support the missions of over 200 individual satellites. CGI had also created the Constellation Control Facility that control's the Galileo Commercial Service's 30 satellites, and software for the first satellite in the world with e-sail . In November 2014 CGI was awarded a new contract by Inmarsat to "support data communications between the pilot and air traffic controller within the European airspace." Inmarsat is the safety communications provider for 98% of airlines. With 16% of CGI's revenue coming from software in 2014, other software projects that year included an app for remote elevator monitoring that uses "machine learning," as well as several high-profile smart grids. In November 2014, CGI was awarded a $2 billion IT contract extension from BCE, which is the parent company of Bell Canada, to continue operating Bell's IT network. A month later, PostNord, a large Nordic logistics company, also renewed its 2005 human resources contract with CGI, with CGI continuing to manage payroll processing for PostNord's 26,000 employees in Sweden.
November 2014, CGI Federal was recognized by the Coalition for Government Procurement for its veteran hiring program. At that point, around a quarter of CGI Federal's new hires each year were war veterans. Also in 2014, Canadian Business named Michael Roach their Most Innovative CEO of the year. Fiscal revenue by the end of 2014 was C$10.5 billion, and in the first quarter of 2015, CGI had revenues of $2.54 billion. Concerning media speculation over new CGI acquisitions, on April 30, 2015, CEO Michael Roach was quoted saying that "CGI will not rush into acquisitions," though the company is "open to deals if there is a strategic fit."Many of CGI's more visible projects in 2015 have been related to software and municipal safety, including an emergency response system for the Estonian Rescue Board. In March 2015 CGI was awarded a contract by the UK Ministry of Defence to provide support for the MOD's Fire Control Battlefield Information System Application and the Fire Control Application systems.In January 2016, CGI and the British Columbia Ministry of Health extended their partnership. Less than a week later, CGI won a contract with the U.S. Navy to work on their NAVSUP Business Systems Center. In March, 2016, CGI secured a $61.2 million contract for support of the Swedish social insurance agency. In May 2016, CGI signed an agreement with Sears Canada for a 10-year modernization. Later in May, CGI won the Queensland government contract for debt recovery. About a week later, CGI launched an initiative with the Canadian Securities Administration to help with IT modernization.In June, CGI signed an eight-year contract with Banque Postale. The same month, the US DISA awarded CGI task order to provide a test and evaluation of DoD Healthcare Management System Modernization. At the end of June, the US State Department extended their global visa processing work with CGI. In August 2016, CGI secured a $34.2 million contract from the US Army Training and Doctrine Command Intelligence Directorate . Later in the month, CGI's software platform was used for the eHealth exchange. CGI aided in the implementation of a California Franchise Tax Board IT modernization project that has generated $2.6 billion in revenue over 5 years. In September 2016, CGI was selected by 139 of Maine's State agencies to strengthen cloud security and workflow with a $39 million contract.In October 2016, George D. Schindler succeeded Michael Roach as the third CEO in CGI's history. Additionally, in October 2016, CGI was awarded a $824M contract by USDA. Soon after, the Department of Veteran Affairs selected the USDA as the provider for their new enterprise financial system. About a week after this news, CGI was selected by Solvay to modernize its IT applications and to support operations. In November 2016, CGI acquired Collaborative Consulting, agreed to work with GAO Financial Management, and signed a 10-year contract with Yellow Pages. A month later, CGI and iA Financial expanded their long-term partnership. In 2017, CGI acquired Affecto Plc. and CGI continues to acquire local and IP-based services firms like JSL and Alcyane.In January 2017, CGI was selected by a UK Environment Agency to develop a cloud-based flood forecasting platform and selected by Veteran Affairs Community Care to work on a care recovery audit. In February 2017, Swedish insurer Alecta hired CGI to modernize its IT capabilities. Also in 2017, CGI acquired Summa Technologies and Paragon Solutions. Additionally, in 2017, CGI acquired Greenwood Village-based IT firm, ECS Team, along with CTS Inc., a large technology company based in Birmingham.In March 2017, the state of Colorado selected CGI to update and modernize their payroll system. CGI also secured a contract with the National Police of the Netherlands in March 2017 to create a digital platform for community policing. In April 2017, CGI began operating the IT system for England's water and sewerage supply market. That same month, both Bisnode, a Swedish data service firm, and Aerojet Rocketdyne, an aerospace company, contracted CGI to manage their IT systems. In May 2017, CGI secured a $43 million contract from the city of Los Angeles and a multi-state cooperative contract to offer an enterprise resource planning SaaS platform. In June 2017, SEB, a Swedish financial services group, selected to implement CGI's transaction platform. The next month, CGI secured a $68 million contract from the Los Angeles County Office of Education. Additionally in July 2017, CGI was awarded four contracts totaling $92.5 million to provide services for U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command programs. In October 2017, CGI was awarded another contract with the U.S. Army for $37.4 billion. The city of Glasgow awarded CGI an IT contract in November 2017.In February 2018, CGI renewed and expanded its IT outsourcing contract with Bombardier Aerospace, and extended its contract with Airbus Group to support its global HR system. Mid-2018, CGI was selected by Fingrid Data Hub to develop and run core DataHub for electricity information exchange and was awarded a $530M DHS CDM contract to support the cyber security of federal agencies. In September 2018, CGI announced a merger with ckc AG and GE and CGI an alliance agreement between CGI and GE to develop and implement electric grid software in North America. A month later, CGI worked with USAID to migrate to a hybrid cloud environment. In the same month, CGI partnered with Scotiabank on intelligent process automation POC for trade finance transactions. A few days earlier, CGI partnered with Hydro-Quebec to launch MILES, a data analytics tool to address the root causes of electricity outages before they occur. In November 2018, CGI partnered with the Swedish Migration Agency to improve its immigration services.In May 2018, CGI signed two strategic application management contracts with SNCF. In the same month, CGI was selected by Meyer Werft to advance its global growth strategy through IT modernization, and CGI partnered with TD to leverage CGI's Wealth360 portfolio management software.In February 2019, CGI entered into an agreement with YIT, a Finnish construction company. In the same year, CGI and League Data extended their outsourcing agreement through 2023. The value of the extensions is $18 million.In late 2019, The Wall Street Journal indicated CGI was part of the Chinese APT10 group's Operation Cloud Hopper hack, which exposed companies' data from 2013 to 2017. The first known target was Rio Tinto, who was accessed through CGI's managed cloud.
Mission
To help our clients succeed through outstanding quality, competence and objectivity, providing thought leadership and delivering the best services and solutions to fully satisfy client objectives in information technology, business processes and management. In all we do, we foster a culture of partnership, entrepreneurship, teamwork and integrity, building a global world class information technology and business process services company.
Vision
To be a global world class end-to-end IT and business consulting services leader helping our clients succeed.
Key Team
Mr. François Boulanger (Pres & COO)
Mr. Andre Imbeau (Co-Founder, Advisor to the Exec. Chairman & Director)
Mr. Timothy J. Hurlebaus (Pres of United States Operations, Commercial & State Gov.)
Mr. Steve Perron (Exec. VP & CFO)
Ms. Leslie McKay (Sr. VP & Chief Information Officer)
Mr. Kevin Morris Linder CA, CPA (Sr. VP of Fin. & Treasury and Head of Investor Relations)
Mr. Benoit Dubé (Exec. VP of Legal & Economic Affairs and Corp. Sec.)
References
Ms. Julie Godin (Co-Chair of the Board and Exec. VP of Strategic Planning & Corp. Devel.)
Mr. George D. Schindler (Pres, CEO & Director)