Behind Schneider Electric's Acquisition of AI Firm Cognite

Schneider Electric has agreed to acquire industrial data and AI software specialist Cognite in a US$3.1bn deal, reinforcing its strategy to deliver smarter energy management and industrial automation technologies.

Operating in more than 100 countries and employing around 160,000 people, Schneider Electric develops solutions that help buildings, data centres, infrastructure and electricity grids operate more efficiently through connected digital systems.

The acquisition is expected to further strengthen the company's ability to support organisations as they modernise energy infrastructure and accelerate the energy transition.

Founded in 2017, Cognite is known for developing industrial data and AI software designed to help organisations make better use of operational data.

The company now employs more than 800 people across the Americas, Europe, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific.

Its cloud-native platform integrates and contextualises complex industrial information using a unified data model and knowledge graph, creating a foundation for AI-driven decision making across industrial operations.

In 2025, Cognite generated more than US$170m in annual revenue, while annual recurring revenue bookings increased by 36% alongside growing adoption of its Atlas AI platform.

Supporting the next stage of the energy transition

As industrial AI evolves beyond analytics into real-time operational execution, companies increasingly require trusted, high-quality data to underpin autonomous decision making.

Cognite's platform has been developed to provide that foundation by combining industrial data with agentic AI capabilities.

This allows organisations to embed AI across plant operations, engineering processes and asset management, helping improve efficiency and operational performance.

For Schneider Electric, the acquisition also enhances the capabilities of its AVEVA software business.

The addition of Cognite complements AVEVA's CONNECT industrial intelligence platform, expanding its ability to support customers throughout the design, construction, operation and optimisation of industrial assets.

By combining Cognite's scalable architecture with CONNECT, customers will be able to apply analytics and industrial AI across the full asset lifecycle, while benefiting from large-scale integration and contextualisation of engineering, operational and enterprise data through Cognite's Data Fusion platform and knowledge graph.

Once completed, the transaction will bring Cognite and AVEVA together within a single industrial intelligence platform designed to support the next generation of AI-enabled operations.

Olivier Blum, CEO of Schneider Electric, says: “Cognite has built something rare, a truly industrial-grade AI platform that turns the complexity of operational data into a competitive advantage.

"This acquisition strengthens AVEVA, Schneider Electric’s wholly owned industrial software company, in the highest-growth segments of the market and positions Schneider Electric at the centre of the next phase of industrial intelligence.

“I have been extremely impressed by the world-class technology team and am convinced their unique AI expertise will be a catalyst in advancing intelligence across Schneider Electric’s portfolio.”

Integrating AI with energy management

Under the terms of the agreement, Schneider Electric will acquire all of Cognite's share capital through an all-cash transaction.

The deal is expected to complete during 2026, after which Cognite will be integrated into AVEVA and reported within Schneider Electric's Industrial Automation business.

The company believes the combination of its energy management expertise with Cognite's industrial AI capabilities will help customers unlock greater efficiency, resilience and sustainability across energy-intensive operations.

“At Schneider Electric, we have always believed the energy transition demands intelligence, intelligence demands data and unlocking its full value requires AI," Olivier adds.

"And the same is required in operations across process and discrete manufacturing where data in context is leveraged by AI leading to efficiency and sustainable outcomes.

“By bringing Cognite into Schneider Electric and AVEVA, we unite the world’s most comprehensive energy management and automation infrastructure with the software and AI capabilities to make it natively intelligent. Together, we go beyond connecting systems. We give them the ability to think, adapt and act. This is what industrial intelligence looks like at scale.”