Seattle-based UX and design firm Blink has been acquired by Mphasis, a publicly-traded IT services giant based in Bangalore, India. The all-cash deal is valued at $94 million.
Founded 21 years ago, Blink works with companies such as Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, NASA, and Starbucks. The firm employs more than 130 people across offices in Seattle, Austin, Boston, San Diego, and San Francisco. It has earned $34 million in revenue so far this year, according to CEO and co-founder Karen Clark Cole.
Blink will retain its name following the acquisition, and all employees are staying aboard.
Clark Cole and her co-founder Kelly Franznick said the deal helps Blink continue being a UX “on a new global stage.”
“We will continue to offer our core UX services, and we will now begin to offer back-end engineering, for complete end-to-end digital product services,” she said. “We are so thrilled to have Mphasis’s engineering skills as part of our expertise, allowing us to follow our strategy and designs through to launch.”
Founded in 1998, Mphasis reported revenue of more than $1.3 billion for its fiscal year ending March 31. It reached a market capitalization of $4.5 billion last year. The company employs more than 20,000 people.
In 2016, Blackstone Group acquired a majority stake in the company from Hewlett Packard.
“The acquisition of Blink, consistent with our M&A focus, is in the forefront of providing well researched design and high impact digital experiences to our clients and their end customers,” Mphasis CEO Nitin Rakesh said in a statement.
Blink grew slowly for years before ramping up. Big corporations recently began knocking on the door, interested in buying Blink. Instead, the firm launched a strategy to themselves acquire smaller companies, aiming to become the biggest UX business around, Cole told GeekWire last year.
Blink did not raise any outside capital, Cole said.
“Create big, bold and clear vision and never give up believing in it,” Cole said when asked for advice for other entrepreneurs. “Take it one day and one step at a time and walk with your head up looking for new opportunities and ways to pivot and always stay relevant.”
Editor’s note: Story updated with comments from Clark Cole.
