Munich, September 25th – Every year the market research and consulting company Lünendonk identifies the leading companies in the German market for consulting, software, and IT services. For the last years ESPRiT Consulting has been named here as well.

ESPRiT Consulting is one of the few consulting firms in the market that is owner run and that is not listed at the stock exchange. Whilst the list of the top 25 is still led by the big players like IBM and Accenture, the study shows that it is smaller, mid-sized consulting firms that are really catching up, and that these smaller firms have posted significantly higher rates of revenue growth than their larger competitors. As an example, ESPRiT was able to record total revenue growth of 41.2 percent from 2006 to 2007. The average rate of revenue growth of all participants in the study was 19.2 percent.

“We are very pleased that a middle-sized, owner-led company such as ESPRiT Consulting is performing very well and positions itself successfully in a very tough market.” comments Thomas Lünendonk, author of the survey and owner of the market research institute.

Karsten Höppner, CEO of ESPRiT Consulting, comments: “Our strategy targets healthy growth of 20 to 25 percent per year regarding both staff size and revenue. This is well above the expectations of the average of the participants in the Lünendonk Survey, who are planning with growth of 13.7 percent for the current year. In the last few years we have generally surpassed our own targets. We see ourselves as an interface between IT and management consulting. In our projects, we come via IT to our goal of providing the management with significant added value. That sets us aside from our competitors, who tend either to stick almost entirely to the field of IT, or who focus solely on management consultancy.”

As ESPRiT does not belong to a larger group of companies and is wholly-owned by the partners, this consulting firm is able to operate flexibly and independently of the interests of shareholders and the need to create shareholder value. This is really appreciated by our clients, since it is larger enterprises that are particularly reluctant to make themselves dependent on other large groups. ESPRiT Consulting provides consulting services for six out of seven Dax 30 companies in Munich and also works together with international companies in Switzerland and Austria.