From Consulting Information Svs

Ten years ago, the world’s largest consultancies were McKinsey & Company, Coopers & Lybrand, Ernst & Young, Price Waterhouse, and Andersen Consulting. Play connect-the-dots with four recent news stories and you can see how the world has evolved:



Last week’s Business Week’s cover story re-stated the obvious – IBM is the biggest, baddest player in the IT services game. Barely a blip on the radar 10 years ago, Sam and Company have amassed the world’s most formidable consulting company (an eerie parallel to current world events).


Accenture cuts loose 1% of the workforce, about 760 of what would have been partners/associate partners in the old AC hierarchy. The move to BPO requires different talent and cost structures. Accenture has sliced away much of the top-heaviness. How much more still needs to go?


BearingPoint (ne KPMG Consulting) gets jabbed by Wall Street for slogging through the netherworld of pure systems integration to BPO nirvana. Like Accenture, BearingPoint is staking a BPO claim without the capital-intense infrastructure of other players (e.g. EDS). Old-style implementation projects sustain such firms as they move from here to there. But the task is exceedingly arduous given depressed IT spending.


General Electric emphasizes its desire to become a top player in IT services. Knowing that GE expects to be #1 in any business it enters, one can’t help but see a major acquisition in the offing. The GE mandate seems to center on life sciences for now, which narrows the list of potential targets.




Hmm the news about GE is interesting...and considering the fact that they are orginating from India out into the world, they are going to beat the pants off everyone else !! IF this develops into offering BPO and IT Services to other firms!!