The German arm of PwC has acquired Drozak Consulting, a procurement consulting firm based in Berlin.
According to Ulrich Störk, Chairman of PwC in Germany, the bolt-on builds on the firm’s strategy to accelerate the growth of its consulting division in the country, and its ambition to beef up its capabilities in high-demand areas. Drozak Consulting is a specialist in procurement and digital operations – two of the hottest segments in consulting amid the Covid-19-induced crisis.
Since the outbreak of the pandemic, companies globally have turned en masse to cost cutting, with procurement in the lead for digging and negotiating savings. The function also plays a key role in building agility in sourcing strategies and more resilient supply chains in general – which in retrospect has been one of the top differentiators for companies that navigated the crisis better than others.
A recent McKinsey & Company study meanwhile labelled the procurement function as “one of the major influencers of post-Covid-19 recovery strategies. The function provides the fundament for dealings with third-party suppliers (driving down costs as a competitive advantage and ensuring business requirements can be met in an agile manner) and forms an important execution lever for many future strategies, including innovation.
Founded in 1997, Drozak Consulting is a management consulting firm that specialises in procurement transformations. Its track record includes advising Dow Jones and DAX listed companies, large global organizations, mid-cap companies and public institutions on cost reduction programs, supply chain efficiency improvements, and tender management, among others.
Notable projects the firm recently delivered include: helping an airline (with around 80 aircraft) slash its procurement spend by around 20% during Covid-19 and help a mobile operator reduce its optimise its supplier portfolio across 20+ countries for a similar service, leading to a new supplier framework with cost savings of over 40% compared to the pre-tender situation.
Drozak Consulting’s team of over 20 professionals – including company founder and managing director Jacek Drozak – will now be integrated into PwC Advisory, and strengthen its procurement, operations and supply chain offerings.
“At a time of volatile raw material markets, supply bottlenecks and increasing regulatory requirements, the demand for expertise in procurement has risen sharply. And in procurement, core processes are changing faster than ever due to digitisation. Drozak Consulting boosts our capabilities in these two areas,” said Störk.
Stefan Schrauf, a partner at PwC Germany added, “With this deal, we are not only strengthening our procurement services but also our network of Chief Procurement Officers and the Operations Consulting service line.”
Earlier deals the firm closed in 2021 and 2020 include a minority stake in Berlin-based startup Statice, a stake in business school DBU, and IXDS, a product design and innovation agency. With almost 12,000 employees generating revenues of more than €2 billion, PwC Germany is one of the firm’s larger member firms globally.
Sourced from Consultancy.org