Accenture veteran Graham Richter joins EY as Partner
Big Four firm EY has named Graham Richter as its new Partner in its tax technology and transformation wing. He arrives having most recently been Managing Director for Accenture Technology, and the consultancy’s UKI Blockchain practice lead.
Digital technology has long been discussed as a potential ‘game-changer’ in modern business, with blockchain in particular having been labelled a key way for companies to save large sums of money in efficiencies, and improve security, productivity and customer experience in the process. While the technology might have been slow to live up to its hype initially, a 2020 survey from Enterprise Strategy Group of 700 finance and operations leaders found blockchain deployments were passing their adoption tipping point, creating significant competitive advantage for organisations.
With that in mind, it is not surprising that attitudes towards blockchain technology are growing increasingly positive across the globe. New Deloitte analysis in the summer found that well over half of global businesses now rate blockchain technology within their top five priorities. The authors pointed to numerous applications of distributed ledger technology in rapidly expanding global markets, as a driving force for this, in a variety of segments, including real estate, communications, project management, and even certification.
The arrival of financial technologies expert Graham Richter subsequently represents a major boost to EY’s tax technology and transformation business. Alongside the firm’s other Partners in the sector, Charles Brayne, Simon Cowan, Harvey Lewis, Richter arrives with almost two decades of consulting and technology experience to his name, having led various technology transformation programmes in that time. Specialising in helping clients to adopt disruptive technology, he has overseen projects regarding AI, blockchain, SAP, automation and analytics, as well as building various market-facing technology capabilities and practices.
Richter joins EY from global consultancy Accenture, where he spent the last 18 years of his career. Before his exit, Richter was Managing Director for Accenture Technology, and was the firm’s UKI Blockchain practice lead. In those roles, he focused on leading complex digital transformation programmes and advising clients on IT transformation, including blockchain, and other established and emerging technologies.
Commenting on his appointment via his personal LinkedIn, Richter said, “I'm absolutely delighted to be joining EY as a Partner… I'll be focusing on the tech-enabled transformation of the tax, law and finance functions of the big corporates, using the best of the established and emerging technologies. I'm very happy to be joining… an amazing team of passionate people who are clearly masters of their craft. Let the exciting next chapter begin!”
