Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co. today announced its latest acquisition, a U.K.-based consulting firm called RedPixie Ltd. that helps enterprises migrate their operations to the public cloud.

The deal will bolster HPE’s Pointnext professional services business. The company previously expanded the division in September by acquiring another cloud consultancy, Massachusetts-based Cloud Technology Partners Inc., for an undisclosed sum.

RedPixie has a narrower focus than that company. Whereas CTP’s area of expertise spans all the major infrastructure-as-a-service platforms, as well as the OpenStack data center operating system, the British firm specializes in projects involving Microsoft Corp.’s Azure cloud.

RedPixie offers a variety of services to companies interested in adopting the platform. The firm’s website details that it can handle traditional consulting projects such as application and database migrations, as well as more ambitious initiatives.

One particular focus area for RedPixie is cloud-based data science. The consultancy says that its engineers can help a company harness Azure’s analytics, machine learning and connected device management services to process various business information. RedPixie also offers to support customers’ data science environments after the initial setup to ensure that everything runs smoothly.

The expertise that the consultancy brings to the table should put HPE’s Pointnext in a better position to compete for Azure projects. That’s particularly true given RedPixie’s impressive track record, which includes engagements with big-name clients such as accounting giant KPMG LLP.

As was the case with the CTP deal, HPE didn’t disclose how much it has agreed to pay for the firm. But the price tag could have been considerable given the strategic importance that the company seems to place on its cloud consulting business. In the acquisition announcement, HPE highlighted research from McKinsey & Co. that showed the “hybrid IT consulting and cloud native development” segment is growing at a rate of more than 18 percent per year.

Image: HPE