ACL Invests in GRC Software Usability with Acquisition of Design Firm Artletic

ACL Continues to Transform GRC Profession with Beautiful Software

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, May 28, 2015 /CNW/ -- ACL, the company that is transforming audit and risk, today announced that it has completed the acquisition of Denver-based Artletic LLC, a digital design firm focused on creating exceptional user experiences through web and mobile applications. With the acquisition, Artletic's team of designers will join ACL as full-time employees, further driving ACL toward its vision of disrupting the GRC software market with software that delivers standout user experiences to more than 14,000 commercial and government customers in over 150 countries.

"A key factor limiting the adoption of GRC software products is the perception – and in many cases reality – that GRC software is not intuitive to use and can be intimidating," said Michael Rasmussen, Founder of GRC 20/20, an independent research firm focused on GRC practices and processes. "One of the highlights of ACL's approach to product design is their focus on usability and I commend the company for investing further with this acquisition."

Founded in 2007, Artletic is a leading user interface design studio helping organizations differentiate their offerings with exceptional design. Artletic has been a key resource to ACL in leading the ongoing evolution of ACL GRC, ACL's revolutionary cloud-based audit, compliance and risk management solution, as well as the transformation of ACL's industry-leading data analytics platform.

"We are on a mission to consolidate the point-solution-dominated GRC category through a platform driven by exceptional user experience, true cloud delivery, and the seamless integration of powerful risk analytics," said Laurie Schultz, President and CEO of ACL. "We're seeing triple-digit growth and industry analyst recognition because customers find our products incredibly intuitive, especially when compared with the market's over-priced, over-built, and outdated alternatives. With the acquisition of Artletic, we are investing further in people who bring world-class software experiences to the audit, compliance, and risk management category, and I could not be more thrilled that the team of UX designers at Artletic will be joining the ACL team."

Driven by its strengths in design, user interface, cloud delivery, and mobile apps, ACL GRC is taking the enterprise software market by storm and excels in the areas most often noted as pain points by customers of traditional GRC software. In a recent survey of 100 executives at current ACL GRC customers, 80% of leaders reported that their team found the software easy or very easy to use. Nearly 75% said that they had actually seen an increase in employee satisfaction on their team and over half felt that using ACL GRC had improved the perception of their team by senior management. More than 50% reported that they had ACL GRC fully deployed and in use after only 15 days.

"We want to change the world, and our work with ACL has been the most challenging and successful in terms of doing that," said Matt Crest, founder and principal of Artletic. "Thanks to this acquisition, we will get the opportunity to go much further, focusing 100% of our time on making the work of hundreds of thousands of GRC professionals around the world easier, more enjoyable, and much more valuable. We've enjoyed an amazing relationship with ACL's team and we simply couldn't miss the opportunity to be a part of this transformation in the way the world's best organizations operate. I can't wait to see what we can do together as one team."

Click here to read recent industry analyst coverage of ACL's GRC solutions:
2015 Market Guide for Audit Management Solutions
2015 Market Guide for Corporate Compliance and Oversight Software

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About ACL
ACL delivers software solutions that are transforming audit, compliance, and risk management to give organizations unprecedented control over their business. www.acl.com

© 2015 ACL Services Ltd. ACL and the ACL logo are registered trademarks of ACL Services Ltd. All other company and product names are trademarks of their respective owners.

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Tom Faust, Stanton Public Relations & Marketing, P. 646-502-3513, E. [email protected], http://www.acl.com