C5i Eyes Market Expansion, Targets Saudi Arabia and Latin America C5i provides solutions such as Digital Analytics, Customer Analytics, Consumer and Market Insights, Marketing Analytics, Industry 5.0 & Supply Chain, and Enterprise AI to industries such as retail, CPG manufacturing, technology, media, telecom, life sciences, and banking

In May 2024, C5i, a leading AI and analytics provider, strategically rebranded itself, transitioning from a data-driven firm leveraging AI to an AI-first company, with data serving as a critical component.

"Our new brand shows our multidimensional work, blending data science, analytics, and AI with diverse human perspectives to solve complex business problems…This rebranding reaffirms our larger goal of combining human and machine capabilities to responsibly drive innovation and growth for businesses," shares Ashwin Mittal, chairman and CEO, C5i.

In 2023, the company raised USD 53 million to earmark a total of USD 80 million for mergers and acquisitions. Taking a step towards accelerating growth, it later acquired Incivus in 2023 and Analytic Edge in July 2024. "The acquisition of Analytic Edge was an important step we took this year toward servicing our clients better and enhancing our end-to-end analytics and AI value chain offerings," Mittal said.

This strategic move is projected to help C5i achieve INR 1,000 crore in revenue by the next financial year and expand its global footprint. "Our outlook remains global, and we are focused on expanding across geographies in the next year. Two regions we have specifically identified for expansion are Saudi Arabia and Latin America," he added. Notably, 98 per cent of C5i's revenue comes from markets in the US, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.

Mittal and team are proactively looking to acquire one more company in the next 6–12 months "one that aligns with our business model and core values, and where we can leverage their capabilities, IP and talent, and client relationships to drive more growth and impact for the industry."

C5i provides a range of solutions such as Digital Analytics, Customer Analytics, Consumer and Market Insights, Marketing Analytics, Industry 5.0 & Supply Chain, and Enterprise AI to industries such as retail, CPG manufacturing, technology, media, telecom, life sciences, and banking.

For large manufacturing clients, it equips employees with a GenAI-powered application to predict upcoming maintenance and get intelligent contextual responses on troubleshooting techniques and escalation matrix. "Recently, for one of our manufacturing clients, we measured the improvements post-deployment of this solution at one of their facilities in the United States. We captured downtime duration reduction by 20 per cent, Mean Time to Repair (MTTR) decreased by 15 per cent and Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) improved by 10 per cent," he said.

Over the next five years, Mittal feels AI will shape the future of business analytics in areas such as Data Processing and Analysis, Predictive and Prescriptive Analytics, Generative AI & Natural Language Processing (NLP), Real-Time Analytics, Personalized Customer Experiences, Cloud and AI Integration, Creation of Data products, Insights to Action, and Multimodal AI.

Multimodal AI applications are expected to become prevalent in several industries. In healthcare, it will combine medical images, patient records, and genetic data to improve diagnoses and treatments; in retail, it will use visual, text, and behavioral data to personalize customer experiences; and in finance, it will analyze news articles, financial reports, and earnings calls to make smarter investment choices.

"As AI becomes more integral to analytics, ensuring Data Quality, Security, and Governance will become more critical. AI Trust, Risk, and Security Management (TRiSM) tools will increasingly be used for proactive data protection, model monitoring, and risk controls," said Mittal.

Looking forward, C5i also plans to expand its portfolio to offer solutions in HR, finance, and risk management and broaden its focus to cater to sectors showing growth potential such as manufacturing and financial sectors.