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KPMG has acquired a German SAP consultancy called QuadriO to strengthen its software services business in Europe.

QuadriO employs about 70 people who work out of three offices in Dresden, Berlin and Mannheim. The firm’s clientele mainly consists of banks, but it also boasts customers in a number of other verticals.

QuadriO focuses primarily on assisting its clients with the deployment and implementation of SAP products. SAP, Europe’s largest software company by sales, develops business applications that companies use to orchestrate key backoffice processes such as HR and logistics.

QuadriO’s first area of expertise is software deployment.

Setting up an SAP application can take months because there are so many features, settings, customization options to sort out. For a bank, hiring a consultancy like QuadriO to manage the task is not only faster but also reduces the chance that its software implementation project will go south.

In addition to setting up SAP software, QuadriO develops custom interfaces for its clients.

SAP applications have default interfaces that are sufficient for many tasks. However, companies often opt to build a custom UI to make their employees’ job easier.

A bank could, for the sake of example, commission QuadriO build a custom UI with shortcuts to the features its employees use most often. UI development is far from being the most difficult programming task, but the experience a consultancy brings to the table is useful in large projects. 

KPMG doesn’t simply plan to absorb QuadriO into its German member firm. Rather, the consultancy will spin off QuadriO and some existing teams into a new unit focused specifically on providing SAP services to financial sector clients.

“We can thus offer our customers end-to-end solutions and also implement large SAP transformations from a single source,” explained Sven-Olaf Leitz, a senior executive at KPMG’s German member firm. “In addition, the acquisition strengthens our market position in the area of development banks.

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