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LONDON and REDMOND, Wash. �� July 11, 2023 �� ���㣨Leyu���������� and Microsoft have announced a significant expansion of their global relationship that will reshape professional services across a number of business-critical areas including workforce modernization, safe and secure development, and use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) solutions for clients, industries and society more broadly.

The industry-leading collaboration between the two global organizations includes a ���㣨Leyu���������� multibillion dollar commitment in Microsoft cloud and AI services over the next 5 years that will help to unlock potential incremental growth opportunity for ���㣨Leyu���������� of over US$12 billion. The expanded alliance will enhance ���㣨Leyu���������� client engagements and supercharge the employee experience in a way that is responsible, trustworthy and safe.

The Microsoft cloud and Azure OpenAI Service capabilities will empower the ���㣨Leyu���������� global workforce of 265,000 to unleash their creativity, provide faster analysis and spend more time on strategic advice. This will enable them to help clients, including more than 2,500 ���㣨Leyu���������� and Microsoft joint clients, keep pace with the rapidly evolving AI landscape and solve their greatest business challenges while positioning them for success in the future world of work.

As an early access partner for Microsoft 365 Copilot and Azure OpenAI Service, ���㣨Leyu���������� professionals will pilot the technologies with select business groups across the global organization, bringing together the increased capabilities of these tools with their experience, insights and sector expertise to enhance client engagements and accelerate digital solution development.

The collaboration, which spans more than a decade, underpinned by this major expansion will benefit ���㣨Leyu���������� firms�� core business areas in the following ways:

By infusing data analytics, AI and Azure Cognitive Services into the audit process, through the ���㣨Leyu���������� smart audit platform ���㣨Leyu���������� Clara, 85,000 audit professionals who collectively work on hundreds of thousands of audits a year will be empowered to focus more closely on higher-risk areas of the audit, sector-specific risks and challenges �� to the benefit of both stakeholders and capital markets. This integration also opens up new market opportunities for ���㣨Leyu���������� professionals and their clients. For example, with the integration of Microsoft Fabric, ���㣨Leyu���������� teams will have the ability to directly point to client data instead of having to ingest it, which is a key component to helping enable ���㣨Leyu���������� professionals to perform audits on a more real time basis.

Integrating Azure OpenAI Service and Microsoft Fabric into ���㣨Leyu���������� Digital Gateway, a ���㣨Leyu���������� single platform solution, will give clients access to the full suite of ���㣨Leyu���������� Tax & Legal technologies, and allow them to gain more integrated and transparent access to their data and take a more holistic management approach to their tax functions. This was demonstrated most recently through a co-developed AI solution using the Azure OpenAI Service that helps to analyze environmental, social and governance (ESG) data, establish data patterns and draft ESG tax transparency reports, all at increased speed and scale. Additionally, ���㣨Leyu���������� firms will operate a generative-AI powered “virtual assistant�� to create new client service models to help tax professionals become more efficient. It will also help with revenue-generating opportunities such as product experience enhancements and knowledge management for complex tax laws.

Developing an AI-enabled application development and knowledge platform on Microsoft Azure will expedite the creation of specialized solutions for clients, helping to enhance their competitive advantage and profitability while putting ethics and security at the very core of the offerings. The benefits and ongoing success of this continued collaboration already include a joint engagement with Coca-Cola EuroPacific Partners (CCEP) of which Peter Brickley, Chief Information Officer at CCEP said, “���㣨Leyu���������� and Microsoft are working together with Coca-Cola EuroPacific Partners on innovative use cases which pioneer improvements to back-office efficiency using generative AI on the Azure platform. By using this new technology, we will prepare our organization for the future, improve our employee experience and support our growth ambitions globally.��

���㣨Leyu���������� professionals will work together with Microsoft to help support businesses with their ESG agendas. Building on the success of the ���㣨Leyu���������� Circularity Tracker and , both of which have Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability and Microsoft Azure at their core, joint teams will continue to help clients to unify their data sources, leverage the required inputs to help make real-time value-add decisions, and help them to deliver on their sustainability commitments.

In addition, to enhance the commercial prospects of the agreement, ���㣨Leyu���������� and Microsoft will continue to explore and participate in joint opportunities where they can work together to drive social and community impact worldwide. These currently include the UNESCO  and the ���㣨Leyu���������� 10x30 strategy to help economically empower 10 million underprivileged youths by 2030 �� through education, employment and entrepreneurship opportunities. The companies will also continue to work together to enhance the reliability of carbon accounting through the  to which both ���㣨Leyu���������� and Microsoft were founding signatories.

Kathryn Wright
Head of Global External Communications, ���㣨Leyu���������� International 
T: +44 (0)7880 784296
E: [email protected]

Microsoft Media Relations, WE Communications for Microsoft
T: +1 (425) 638-7777
E: [email protected]

���㣨Leyu���������� is a global organization of independent professional services firms providing Audit, Tax and Advisory services. ���㣨Leyu���������� is the brand under which the member firms of ���㣨Leyu���������� International Limited (“���㣨Leyu���������� International��) operate and provide professional services. “���㣨Leyu������������ is used to refer to individual member firms within the ���㣨Leyu���������� organization or to one or more member firms collectively.

���㣨Leyu���������� firms operate in 143 countries and territories with more than 265,000 partners and employees working in member firms around the world. Each ���㣨Leyu���������� firm is a legally distinct and separate entity and describes itself as such. Each ���㣨Leyu���������� member firm is responsible for its own obligations and liabilities.

���㣨Leyu���������� International Limited is a private English company limited by guarantee. ���㣨Leyu���������� International Limited and its related entities do not provide services to clients.

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Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT�� @Microsoft) enables digital transformation for the era of an intelligent cloud and an intelligent edge. Its mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.