IBM has announced new tools and consultancy services designed to help firms manage information assets more effectively across the organisation, and unify the way they access and use that information.

The new offerings focus on 18 key industries, including consumer products, electronics, energy and utilities and telecoms.

They include new IBM Foundation tools to help firms discover and govern information, and industry-specific Information Agenda guides and workshops designed to aid the creation of an information strategy, according to IBM.

The firm is also offering industry accelerators, such as data models, designed to improve performance and reduce risk.

Information on Demand Competency Centres, meanwhile, will help customers build their own in-house business transformation expertise.

"In the last few years IBM has focused on information on-demand strategy, but if you talk to customers the key question is where do I start – how do I facilitate the information through to business applications?" explained Doug Coombs, IBM's enterprise content management product marketing leader.

"What we're doing is providing the ability for our customers to create an agenda around their information needs."

IBM also announced a new Enterprise Information Strategy and Roadmap through its Global Business Services arm to help firms assess their needs and accelerate development and deployment of enterprise information strategies.