Boutiques Connell Consulting and Eccleston Associates join forces

Two London-based consultancies specialised in strategy and commercial due diligence work – Connell Consulting and Eccleston Associates – have joined forces.

Since its inception in 2003, Connell Consulting has worked on over 300 commercial due diligence reports and strategic projects. The firm focuses on three key sectors: healthcare, social care and education.

Founded in 2018, Eccleston Associates also specialises in commercial due diligence work and strategic projects with a focus on the life sciences, pharma, healthcare and alternative investments sectors. From its base in the UK, the firm works for clients nationally and across Europe.

The combination of the two consulting firms sees their joint headcount double to around 25 consultants, while expanding their capabilities both across industry verticals and geography.

“During the past decade, we’ve turned down many projects in the pharma, biotech, medical equipment and European transactions, to focus on UK health and social care projects. We’ve been turning down three to five projects a week due to a lack of sector expertise to deliver these projects,” said Clare Connell, the CEO of Connell Consulting.

“We are delighted to be able to work on pharma, biotech and European healthcare transactions. We’ve always wanted to expand into these markets, but we lacked the deep sector experience and capacity that we have now.”

For Connell, the joining of forces sees her reunite with Gonçalo Silva, who founded Eccleston Associates after a 20-plus year career as an independent consultant (affiliated to among others Candesic) and at global strategic consultancy Roland Berger.

“I worked with Gonçalo at Candesic for many years,” Connell said. “After he moved to the UK four years ago, built up his team and managed a number of large pharma transactions, we realised it was a perfect time for him to join us. We have the same plans, and our teams have a very similar culture and good work ethic.”

The new merged setup sees Connell continue as CEO of the health, social care and education business in the United Kingdom, while Silva has been appointed CEO of the pharma and European healthcare business.

Silva: “This is a new chapter to my life. It is a challenge. It is a very interesting objective to take Connell Consulting to the next level. Knowing the market very well, I think we are in a fantastic position to do so.”

“We can be a major player in the life sciences strategy consulting market. We have a very strong combination of backgrounds that is really difficult to find in the market. The team has deep knowledge in both small molecules and biologics/biosimilar, originators and generics, with several MBAs and PhDs in the field,” Silva concluded.