UK consultancies Elixirr & Baringa add senior consultants to US arms
UK management consultancies Elixirr and Baringa have both bolstered their US consulting teams over the past weeks. Milan Davé joins Elixirr from Infosys Consulting and strengthens the firm’s Silicon Valley base, while Baringa has relocated Ben Reid from London to the US where he joins the firm’s regional leadership team.
Elixirr and Baringa have both been going through sustained periods of growth recently, with the two consulting firms looking to continue expanding into the future. Besides operating in the UK, Elixirr is also active in Johannesburg, South Africa. Baringa has further offices in Dusseldorf and Abu Dhabi, however, with the US economy continuing to perform well, the UK-headquartered duo are looking to invest States-side to expand their client-bases in the world’s largest national consulting market. The US management consulting market alone grew to a value of $58 billion last year.
Understandably, the two firms are not the only consultancies originating from the UK which that have made the jump to the globe’s largest consulting market, as British companies are increasingly looking to tap into the highly profitable locale to boost profits. Brickendon opened an office in New York in 2016, while a year later, FinTech advisory 11:FS also expanded into the Big Apple, which is also the largest financial hub of North America and the world. Financial services consultancy Bovill and the Egremont Group meanwhile chose Chicago for their US bases, thanks to the Windy City’s own strong links to the financial world. In the opposite direction meanwhile, American consultancy John Kotter recently chose London as its EU base due to the British capital’s current ease of access for the European market.
In 2015, the year Elix-IRR rebranded as Elixirr, the consultancy announced it would become the first of the firms to make the leap to the United States, opening an innovation hub in the world renowned Silicon Valley. The firm’s presence in the US went from strength to strength thereafter, as they built a strong client base across the country, and further expanded their extensive network of VCs, startups, and entrepreneurs, as the US market responded extremely positively to the different approach taken by the Brits. As a result, Elixirr, which was recently named one of the world’s top 20 outsourcing consulting firms by the International Association of Outsourcing Professionals, were able to continue expanding the division with new hires.
Now, the latest addition to the American Elixirr outfit sees former Accenture and Infosys employee Milan Davé join the firm. Davé, who will become a Principal at Elixirr, arrives after a diverse career spanning two decades, including web developer roles at PeopleSoft and Charles Schwab before joining Chevron in 2002, most recently working there as a Global Change Manager. In 2006 Milan moved to Accenture, where he specialised in organisational change for two years, becoming a Senior Consultant in the process before exiting in 2008. Following a further 2 year stint with software provider Backbase, focusing on professional services applications before a 2011 move to consultancy Infosys. Working in the firms San Francisco office, Davé became an Associate Partner, working in management consulting services which again focused on organisational change. After a 6 years tenure with the organisation, Milan moved to Elixirr’s office, also in San Francisco, to become a Principal. The firm hopes he will be able to use his extensive change management experience to use delivering innovative solutions through emerging technology for Fortune 500 organisations.
Davé will join Greg Prokter and Sinan Gurman under the leadership of Eric Rich on the ground in Silicon Valley. Rich, who joined in April last year, said of his new team member, “We continue to strengthen our innovation network here in Silicon Valley through our relationships with venture capital firms, startups, entrepreneurs, and academics. Milan brings the right entrepreneurial mindset and transformation experience to immediately make a positive impact to our clients and our firm… I’m excited to have him join the team.”
Baringa Partners
Baringa meanwhile opened office in the US early this year, with the new premises established in January 2017. The firm expanded its footprint into New York city in a bid to better support its US financial services clients, as they strive to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing competitive and regulatory landscape. The financial industry faces a host of challenges, including the potential of disruptive technologies wielded by FinTechs markets and to more stringent regulatory requirements as a result of recent scandals.
The unit, which is led by former Accenture consultant James Nicholls, has also seen growth in region. The firm state they are looking to building a world-class team of specialist financial services consultants with a focus on risk management, regulatory compliance and operational excellence, with a distinctive culture and pragmatic, hands-on approach to consulting in order to attract the industry's leading practitioners, consultants and former regulators. The latest news from Baringa is not of an external hire however, rather of a promotion, in the form of long-serving employee Ben Reid, who first arrived at Baringa in 2010 as a Senior Consultant. Having risen through the ranks in the firm’s London practice, Reid has now been confirmed as a Director at Baringa Partners' US office in New York City.
Reid has specialised in financial services over his career, having previously worked on the implementation of a Graduate Scheme, and the breaking up and integration of Dutch bank ABN Amro for the Royal Bank of Scotland, however he has experience working in diverse international settings, having also earlier worked in Japan as in Instructor in Human Services for Nova Japan, an English language tutoring service. The firm will hope his financial services background and adaptability to new environments will help them court new clients in the American financial sector.
