By: Josh Getman

Aquent Inc. has long been associated with the creative staffing world. However, with its recent acquisition of IT solutions provider Renaissance Worldwide, the Boston-based Aquent is expanding its services and diversifying the core of its business.

John Chuang, CEO of Aquent, says that the line between Web-based creative professionals and IT departments began to blur over time, at least in the eyes of the client companies. "When people originally thought of Aquent, they thought of creative," he says. "What happened was, especially with the rise of the Web, we started to place a lot of people with the IT departments of our client companies, doing front-end design work. As we started working with those clients, we started getting requests to work on a lot of back-end stuff."

This purely technical aspect of staffing was not originally part of Aquent's repertoire. But, instead of merely providing a referral service for an IT staffing firm, Aquent made the bold decision to reinvent the company by getting into the technical game. "With Renaissance, we have the ability and the capability to help companies with their back-end needs," says Chuang.

Aquent's acquisition of Renaissance also indicates Chuang's optimism about the struggling IT staffing industry. After all, why invest in an IT staffing company if you don't see a light at the end of the economic tunnel? "I feel very positive and optimistic about the state of IT services, from both the client end and the talent end, " he says. "On the talent end, there's a shortage of IT talent in the long run. We're very positive about the growth and the future of this industry."

However, even Chuang admits that the bright future of the IT staffing industry may be a little further down the road. He notes that Aquent's acquisition of Renaissance is a long-term endeavor. "It's definitely about meeting the needs of our clients, " he says. "It's not as much about optimizing the quarter as it is about building a solid business for our clients. We're definitely taking a longer-term view.