‘Perfect’ time to take on the big four consultants: NY firm
The new local country head of a major New York-headquartered professional services firm best known for restructuring bankrupt investment bank Lehman Brothers says the timing is “perfect” for it to bring its business to Australia and compete with its larger rivals.
“But it has been a long time of planning well ahead of that. But, absolutely, we see this as an opportunity,” said David Willis, who left KPMG as its private equity head in March to join Alvarez & Marsal. “It is perfectly timed, but [PwC’s tax scandal and EY’s failed restructure] was not by our design.”
David Willis left KPMG, where he was its local private equity head, to join Alvarez & Marsal. Dominic Lorrimer
A&M has poached another three managing directors from KPMG as it continues to expand. In the past four months it has also hired from EY, Deloitte and BCG as it builds its local operation in a bid to win a share of fees private equity firms and corporations pay for transaction advisory work
KPMG’s Doug Houston, David Savage and Mark Schiavello will join their former colleague, Steven Shirtliff, and former EY tax experts Adam Woodward, Sean Keegan, Andrew Sharp and Edward Consett at A&M.
Former BCG staffers Timo Schmid and Nick Reid also moved, along with ex-Deloitte M&A tax partner James Head, The Australian Financial Review’s Street Talk column reported in June.
A&M began considering entering the Australian market more than two years ago, yet its timing comes at an opportune moment for the firm. PwC is entangled in a tax leaks scandal, first reported by the Financial Review in May. The fallout has led PwC to sell its government consulting arm – rebranded Scyne – for $1 to private equity firm Allegro Funds.
And EY’s attempt to split auditing from its
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