• by Richard Whitman , Columnist, February 4, 2016

Last week, IBM acquired 300-person digital agency Resource/Ammirati. Then early this week, Big Blue acquired digital agency Aperto. Now the ad agency wannabe has scooped up design agency Ecx.io. It's all to bolster the tech company's in-house agency Interactive Experience or iX. 

IBM iX Global Leader Paul Papas noted that the three acquisitions are designed to help bolster the capabilities of iX and, in the case of Ecx.io which has worked in the area of commerce and content management, to cement IBM's existing relationships with companies like Adobe.

Of IBM's acquisition strategies, Papas said: “We’ve been in the design space in iX, going back over 20 years. Unlike some of the other firms we compete against, we have built a world-class capability from the ground up over many years, as opposed to reactions from other folks buying into this space.”

A not-so-subtle jab at Publicis and its acquisition of Sapient?