Nike has announced its acquisition of Celect, a Boston-based retail predictive analytics and demand sensing firm. Nike plans to use Celect’s capabilities to execute its Consumer Director Offense strategy and give customers a more personalized retail experience globally.

“With the acquisition of Celect, Nike greatly accelerates our digital advantage by adding a platform developed by world-class data scientists.” said Eric Sprunk, Nike, chief operating officer. “As demand for our product grows, we must be insight-driven, data-optimized and hyper-focused on consumer behavior. This is how we serve consumers more personally at scale.”

Nike will gain access to Celect’s intellectual property portfolio and cloud-based analytics platform, which will allow the brand to optimize inventory through multiple channels. Celect’s team will immediately be absorbed into Nike’s Global Operations Team, while its co-founders will continue teaching at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and act as consultants to Nike.

“We’re thrilled to be joining the Nike team, adding our unique and innovative capabilities to the data and analytics foundation they’ve been building over the years,” said John Andrews, Celect CEO.