Roland Berger (company)

Roland Berger
Partnership
Industry Management consulting
Founded 1967
Headquarters Munich, Germany
50 offices in 36 countries
Key people
 • Roland Berger, Honorary Chairman
• Charles-Edouard Bouée, CEO
• Marcus Berret,
Chairman of the Supervisory Board
Revenue US$ 1,200 million (2011 estimate)
Number of employees
 2,400 consultants
Website www.rolandberger.com

Roland Berger is a global strategy consulting firm headquartered in Munich, with 50 offices in 36 countries. The company was founded under the name Roland Berger Strategy Consultants in 1967 by Roland Berger.[1] In 2011, the company's sales were roughly US$1.2 billion.[2] The company, with around 2,400 employees worldwide, is an independent partnership wholly owned by its approximately 220 partners.[3][4]

Roland Berger operates as a generalist strategy consultancy[5] and advises clients on management issues ranging from strategy development to performance improvement. Roland Berger advises in the fields of restructuring and marketing, with a focus on the automobile industry and the capital goods sector.[1]

History

Company founder Roland Berger established the firm in 1967, after four years of working for Gennaro Boston Associati in Boston and Milan, Italy. By 1987 the firm became the largest consultancy in Germany, with sales over DM 100 million.[6]

To finance overseas expansion, Berger then allowed Deutsche Bank to take a minority stake, rising to 75.1% in 1988. This proved to be a problem in the United States, where the Federal Reserve Bank did not allow subsidiaries of commercial banks to practise consulting, so the company's managers bought back Deutsche Bank's shares in 1998 and 2000.[6]

Roland Berger logo prior to its 2015 renaming and rebranding

In November 2010, the firm reached an advanced stage in talks to merge with Deloitte's consulting arm, but withdrew after Roland Berger's partners decided instead to invest more of their own resources.[7] In 2013 the partners requested the executive committee to consider "external options" and a possible sale — Ernst & Young reportedly made an offer which was eventually rejected by the partner group.[8][9] In June 2015, Roland Berger acquired the entire team from German consulting firm FMC Consultants GmbH.[10]

The company announced a rebranding of its business in September 2015, introducing a logo it describes as a "titanium B" combined with the lettering "Roland Berger", dropping "Strategy Consultants" from the company name.[11][12]

Organization

Corporate organization is based on global offices, referred to as "competence centers", along functional and industry lines.

Roland Berger has a total of 50 offices in 36 countries around the world.[13][14] Four of these offices are in North America: Chicago, Detroit, Boston and Montreal.[13]

Services and clientele

Roland Berger provides restructuring and marketing advice, but its practice areas also include corporate development, corporate finance, information management, operations strategy, performance improvement, and strategy development. While its clientele is largely in the automobile industry and the capital goods sector, other industry specialties include energy and chemicals, engineered products and high-tech, financial services, information communications, pharmaceuticals and health care, public services, and transportation.[15][16]

Roland Berger clients include corporations, non-profit organizations and public institutions.[1]

Projects and initiatives

Since 2013, Roland Berger's pro bono engagement has focused on promoting education via the Roland Berger Foundation, which was established in 2008 by the firm's honorary chairman Roland Berger and endowed with EUR €50 million.[17] With its German scholarship program, the Foundation supports gifted children and young people from socially disadvantaged families. As of 2014, the program supports 500 individual pupils aged 6 to 18 years across Germany.[18]

In 2006, the company founded the Best of European Business Awards.[19] It sponsors the Counterparts initiative to support culture and education in Central and Eastern Europe,[20] and also supports the Young Global Leaders program of the non-profit World Economic Forum.[21] The firm has also been a supporter of Focus: HOPE, a non-profit organization aiming to overcome racism and poverty through education, which is based in Detroit where Roland Berger has one of its U.S. offices.[17]

On 30 January 2012, the company said it was in the process of collecting €300 million from financial institutions and business intelligence agencies to set up an independent non-profit credit rating agency, to be called the European Rating Agency, which could provide its first country ratings by the end of the year.[22] On 19 April 2013, the ERA effort failed after negotiations with a private European group of investors ended without agreement.[23]

Key people

Publications

think: act is the brand aggregating the corporate publishing formats of Roland Berger, which include books, brochures, magazines and surveys. think:act magazine is put out three times per year, with editions in Chinese, English and German. Through its academic imprints, Roland Berger has published over 40 books.[17]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Richter, Konstantin (17 August 1999). "German Consulting Guru Is Seeking a U.S. Audience". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 2010-11-22.
  2. ↑ Gapper, John (2013-08-28). "The strategy consultants in search of a strategy". Financial Times. ISSN 0307-1766. Retrieved 2015-09-27. (subscription required (help)).
  3. ↑ "Who we are". Roland Berger. Retrieved 2015-08-28.
  4. ↑ "History of Roland Berger & Partner GmbH – FundingUniverse". www.fundinguniverse.com. Retrieved 2016-04-27.
  5. ↑ "More bang for your buck", The Financial Times, 19 November 2007
  6. 1 2 "Roland Berger & Partner GmbH — Company Profile, Information, Business Description, History, Background Information on Roland Berger & Partner GmbH". Referenceforbusiness.com. Retrieved 2015-08-01.
  7. ↑ Adam Jones (2010-11-21). "Berger drops Deloitte merger plans". Financial Times. Retrieved 2010-11-22.
  8. ↑ "Charles-Edouard Bouée must restructure Roland Berger to ensure its independence". FirmsConsulting.com. Retrieved 2015-10-03.
  9. ↑ "Roland Berger set to go it alone". Financial Times. 17 Dec 2013.
  10. ↑ "Latest News from the World of Consultancy". www.consultant-news.com. Retrieved 2015-08-28.
  11. ↑ "Roland Berger rebranded: 'titanium B' with the "Roland Berger" lettering". Business Intelligence Middle East. 9 September 2015. Retrieved 2015-09-26.
  12. ↑ Berger, Roland. "Roland Berger Rebranded: "titanium B" With the "Roland Berger" Lettering Highlights the Company's Strategic Realignment Beyond Traditional Strategy Consulting". www.prnewswire.com. Retrieved 2016-04-27.
  13. 1 2 "Company". Roland Berger. Retrieved 2015-08-01.
  14. ↑ "Locations". Roland Berger. Retrieved 2015-09-27.
  15. ↑ "Expertise". www.rolandberger.com. Retrieved 2015-09-26.
  16. ↑ "Roland Berger partners with Startup Lisboa". www.consultancy.uk. Retrieved 2016-04-27.
  17. 1 2 3 Vault Guide to the Top 50 Management and Strategy Consulting Firms (2014 ed.). Vault. 2013. ISBN 978-1581319033. Retrieved 3 October 2015.
  18. ↑ "Corporate Responsibility | Company". Roland Berger. 2014-10-01. Retrieved 2015-08-01.
  19. ↑ "Welcome To". Best of European Business. Retrieved 2015-08-01.
  20. ↑ "Counterparts". Counterparts. Retrieved 2015-08-01.
  21. ↑ "Roland Berger unterstützt die Young Global Leaders — gesellschaftliches Engagement als verbindendes Element von Führungskräften weltweit". Trading-house.net. 2011-03-31. Retrieved 2015-08-01.
  22. ↑ Eder, Florian (2012-01-20). "Bonitätswächter wehren sich gegen Staatseinmischung". Die Welt. Retrieved 2012-01-20.
  23. ↑ "European Rating Agency Plan Founders on Lack of Financing". Bloomberg.
  24. ↑ "Global executive committee | Company management | Company". Roland Berger. Retrieved 2015-08-01.
  25. ↑ "Roland Berger Strategy Consultants: Charles-Edouard Bouée Elected New CEO". Wallstreet-online.de. 2014-06-28. Retrieved 2015-08-01.
  26. ↑ "Supervisory Board". Roland Berger. Retrieved 2015-08-25.
  27. ↑ "Supervisory Board of Roland Berger Strategy Consultants appoints new Chairman". Roland Berger. July 8, 2015. Retrieved 2015-08-25.
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