Acquisition Combines Huron Legal’s Law Department Cost Management Offering with Legal Analytics

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 8, 2015-- Huron Consulting Group Inc. (NASDAQ: HURN), a leading provider of business consulting services, today announced the Company has acquired Sky Analytics, Inc., a Massachusetts-based provider of legal spend management software for corporate law departments. The addition strengthens Huron Legal’s law department management offering and complements Huron’s deep consulting expertise.

“Analytics provide an opportunity to improve law department performance, both in financial management of legal matters and outcomes for general counsel, while also reducing costs and driving efficiency. The Sky Analytics acquisition combines legal spend analytics with Huron Legal’s existing law department offerings,” said James H. Roth, chief executive officer and president, Huron Consulting Group. “This investment is part of Huron’s long-term commitment to delivering the most innovative solutions to general counsel.”

Sky Analytics provides in-house legal departments with a web-based platform to access on-demand legal spend information and analytics. The platform provides a snapshot of legal matters handled by outside counsel and other vendors as well as access to similar information provided by other participating companies for purposes of benchmarking. The dashboard also offers legal departments key performance indicators and trend metrics which can be flexibly analyzed, including by time frame, practice area and business unit. Sky Analytics’ law firm scorecards measure and benchmark specific activities of law firms and lawyers, including rates, billing practices, staffing and matter efficiency.

“Since our founding, we have worked to bridge the gap between e-billing providers and consulting services and provide an unprecedented level of transparency to corporate law departments,” said Doug Ventola, president, Sky Analytics. “Now, with Huron Legal, we are creating a new category in legal spend management and changing the face of the legal consulting industry through analytics. We look forward to bringing our legal analytics technology to Huron’s clients.”

“Sky Analytics has altered the playing field in legal spend benchmarking and analytics by transforming data into real-time actionable intelligence that law departments can use to manage spending and make more informed decisions,” said Bob Rowe, executive vice president, Huron Legal. “Through this acquisition, we will create the largest and most sophisticated legal spend database, offering our global clients more transparency and greater value.”

The acquisition will result in Sky Analytics’ executive, technical and sales professionals joining the Huron Legal team. Doug Ventola will join Huron Legal as a managing director. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. For reporting purposes, Sky Analytics will be included in the Huron Legal segment, which accounts for more than 25% of Huron’s overall revenue.

About Huron Legal

Huron Legal provides advisory and business services to assist law departments and law firms to enhance organizational effectiveness and reduce legal spend. Huron Legal advises on and implements strategy, organizational design and development, outside counsel management, operational efficiency, and discovery solutions, and provides services relating to the management of matters, contracts, documents, records, digital evidence and e-discovery. Huron Legal is not a law firm; it does not offer, and is not authorized to provide, legal advice or counseling in any jurisdiction. Learn more at www.huronconsultinggroup.com/legal or follow us on Twitter: @HuronLegal.

About Huron Consulting Group

Huron Consulting Group helps clients in diverse industries improve performance, transform the enterprise, reduce costs, leverage technology, process and review large amounts of complex data, address regulatory changes, recover from distress and stimulate growth. Our professionals employ their expertise in finance, operations, strategy and technology to provide our clients with specialized analyses and customized advice and solutions that are tailored to address each client's particular challenges and opportunities to deliver sustainable and measurable results. The Company provides consulting services to a wide variety of both financially sound and distressed organizations, including healthcare organizations, leading academic institutions, Fortune 500 companies, governmental entities and law firms. Huron has worked with more than 425 health systems, hospitals, and academic medical centers; more than 400 corporate general counsel; and more than 350 universities and research institutions. Learn more at www.huronconsultinggroup.com.

About Sky Analytics

Sky Analytics provides corporate legal departments with web-based tools and analytics to better manage outside legal spend. Sky Analytics' legal spend management solution is quick to implement and works with paper or PDF invoices or existing e-billing programs. Visit Sky Analytics at http://www.skyanalytics.com or on Twitter: @LawSpendClarity.

Statements in this press release that are not historical in nature, including those concerning the Company’s current expectations about its future requirements and needs, are “forward-looking” statements as defined in Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the “Exchange Act”) and the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements are identified by words such as “may,” “should,” “expects,” “provides,” “anticipates,” “assumes,” “can,” “will,” “meets,” “could,” “likely,” “intends,” “might,” “predicts,” “seeks,” “would,” “believes,” “estimates,” “plans” or “continues.” These forward-looking statements reflect our current expectations about our future requirements and needs, results, levels of activity, performance, or achievements, including, without limitation, current expectations with respect to, among other factors, utilization rates, billing rates, and the number of revenue-generating professionals; that we are able to expand our service offerings; that we successfully integrate the businesses we acquire; and that existing market conditions continue to trend upward. These statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, including, among others, those described under “Item 1A. Risk Factors” in our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2013, and under “Item 1A. Risk Factors” in our Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2014, that may cause actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from any anticipated results, levels of activity, performance or achievements expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. We disclaim any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements as a result of new information or future events, or for any other reason.

Source: Huron Consulting Group Inc.

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