| | By Mick James
The increasingly
populous UK consultancy
market has gained
another high-profile
name with the launch of
a European branch of
Hitachi Consulting,
which opened offices in
the UK, Spain and
Portugal. Hitachi may be
little known as a
consulting brand in
Europe, but the firm
already has a strong
presence in its home
region of Japan and Asia
– and has built up a
1,000 strong consultancy
in North America.
In the UK the growth
of this subsidiary will
be spearheaded by
managing vice president
Charles Reekie, most
recently working in the
public sector with
Unisys, but also a
veteran of the defunct
Andersen Business
Consulting. The managing
vice presidents in Spain
and Portugal are also
Andersen veterans, and
this turns out to be no
coincidence. Hitachi
built its US consulting
operations around a
number of niche
acquisitions, including
in 2002 parts of the
Andersen Business
Consulting network,
which at that time was
rapidly fragmenting as
its parent accounting
firm was torn apart by | |
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“You have two
options,” explains
Reekie. “Acquire
something or hire some
people and see how they
get on. The first option
is expensive and high
risk, and to do the
second the culture has
to be carefully built.
So there are benefits to
hiring someone with the
connections and the
knowledge already in
place; you know what the
chances of working
together successfully
are.”
This strategy also
explains the choice of
Spain and Portugal for
the initial European
launch, where Andersen
had not only had a
strong presence but had
been hit hard by the
fragmentation of the
practice.
“The partners were
unhappy at being split
up,” says Reekie. “They
missed the community of
spirit. Also Iberia is a
strong growing market,
with leverage into South
America.”
Reekie says that
while Hitachi’s plan is
mainly for organic
growth through hiring,
it does not preclude the
odd niche acquisition.
Growth will however fit
in with the “consensual
and conservative”
culture inherited by its
Japanese parent.
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“There will be growth
but we’re not in the
market to fling money
around,” says Reekie,
adding that the UK unit
is targeted to top the
30 consultant mark in a
year’s time. France and
Germany will be the most
likely spots for the
next wave of European
offices, although
Scandinavia and Benelux
are also under
consideration.
The services offered
by the consultancy will
not perhaps be as
hi-tech slanted as the
Hitachi name might
suggest, but rather
reflect the business
consulting culture of
Hitachi Consulting in
the US, which was
originally built on
acquisitions from Grant
Thornton and BDO.
“The template of
services offered in the
US will be the starting
point for the UK, but it
won’t be slavishly
followed and won’t
preclude adding others,”
says Reekie. The UK
firm’s main focus will
be on the ever-popular
financial services and
public sectors, together
with assignments drawn
from Hitachi’s existing
client base.
“We hope to provide
client-side advice
about, for example,
large scale procurement | |
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| | in the public sector and
transformational
programme management in
the private sector,”
says Reekie. “We don’t
necessarily see
ourselves as a head
contractor in these
programmes – we want to
be seen as the client’s
friend rather than a
supplier.”
Where appropriate, he
says the consulting firm
will also take “world
class leading solutions”
such as fingerprint
recognition technology
developed by Hitachi and
incorporate them into
consulting offerings.
With a solid
foundation for future
growth, Hitachi
Consulting is yet
another addition to the
list of possibilities
for ambitious
consultants with an eye
on their future
leadership prospects. In
recent months we’ve seen
three major waves of
entrants into the
consultancy market:
well-established
companies launching
consultancy arms, Big
Four firms re-entering
the market and
disaffected Big Four
heavyweights setting up
on their own. In its own
way, Hitachi Consulting
is a rather spooky
combination of all
three.
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