E - m o i:l p b j @ l i b e r i y n e t . o r g .

l6,
Web site: www.omcity.comr/philodelphio September
5-11,1997 Vol. No. 30 . $1.25

A groupthat thinksit hasthe answers

CAROLPATTON
SPECIAL
TOTHEBUSINESS
JOURNAL
CONSHOHOCKEN - Earlier this
yea4 49 KPMG Peat Marwick employ-
ees left the consulting arm of the Big
Six accounting frrm to start Answer-
Think Consulting Group, a Miami-
based consulting and systems integra-
tion company.
The exodus of manpower, most of
whom were KPMG partners and
senior managers, was led by
AnswerThink's co-founders:
. Ted Fernandez, former national
managing partner of KPMG's strate-
gic services consulting;
. Allan Frank, chief technology offr-
cer, national partner in charge of
enabling technologies and global ser-
vice leader for enabling technologies
consulting worldwide; and

I
B O BF L E I S C H H A U/EB
"lsn't capitalismwonderful?" RU S I N E SJ S
OURNAL

AllanFrank Led by technology guru Frank, the industry is attracting and retaining
AnswerThink
co-founder Conshohocken operation is expected talent. With firms competing for
O to be one of AnswerThink's largest skilled workers, he said turnover
offices. Frank had led the enabling rates have climbed as high as 25 per-
technologies practice at KPMG's think cent.
tank in Radnor. "We're creating a system where the
. IJlysses Knotts, national partner AnswerThink's founders have built successofthe entire organization ulti-
in charge of sales and marketing. their organizationwith more than $20 mately accrues to each and every
million from two venture capital owner," Frank said.
"It really comes down to having the
energy and the desire to create some- frrms, Golder, Thoma, Cressey,Rauner
thing with our own hands," explained Inc. of Chicago and Miller Capital
Allan Frank, AnswerThink's chief
Management Inc. of Coconut Grove,
Fla. The company's goal is to go public
o
technology officer in the company's
Conshohocken office. "We want to during 1998, Frank said. "We are using knowledge
redefrne consulting and the experi- AnswerThink's equity-based system managementconceptsat the
ence that clients and customers have where "everybody's an owner," as
with firms like ours." opposed to a tiered partnership model very core of our business. Since
Incorporated in April, the company that has been adopted by frrms like we are just one big brain, the
supports six other locations KPMG, served as a signifrcant tool to
secure funds for internal growth,
real value of our people is the
Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, New
York City and San Jose, Calif. With acquisitions and new products and combined intellectual assetsof
about a dozen national clients, its pro- services, Frank said. everybody'sexperiences."
jected revenues for this year are $40 The equity-based structure is also
million, but Frank said that number intended to curb employee turnover to AllanFrank
may snowball to $500 million within less than 10 percent, predicted Frank, AnswerThink
co-founder
three vears. adding that the No. 1 issue in the a
PHILADELPHIA
BUSINESS
IOURNAL O TELECOMMUNICATIONS
AnswerThink has 160 employees.
Frank said the company is expected to
increase its staff to 300 by October
and 500 by next March.
Early on, the company's start was
thwarted by a breach-of-contract suit
filed by KPMG, which declined to com-
ment on AnswerThink or its own
restructuring plan.
While the suit was settled in May,
Frank said AnswerThink's initial
focus was on establishing core company
values rather than developing its
technical infrastructure and sought
ways to capture employee knowledge.
It soon developed a technology called
Mind Share, which logs sharable
employee knowledge and experiences.
"We are using knowledge manage-
ment concepts at the very core of our
business," said Frank, adding that
AnswerThink's employees view the
practice as a natural extension or
byproduct of the company's opera-
tions. "Since we are just one big brain,
the real value of our people is the
combined intellectual assets of every-
body's experiences."
In June, the company expanded its
intellectual assets by merging with
Relational Technologies Inc., an
Oracle applications implementation
and systems integration firm in
Dallas and Atlanta. It also agreed to
purchase the Continuous Improvement
Center, formerly a part of the Institute
of Management Accountants.
Frank said the company merged
with Relational Technologies because
By permissionof The Philadelphia
BusinessJournal,400 MarketStreet,Suite300, Philadelphia,
Reprintedby ReprintlvlanagementServices,(717)560-2001.
& COMPUTERS
of its proven track record for imple-
menting Oracle package solutions and
that its management team, which was
compatible with senior staff at
AnswerThink, possessed a synergy of
Oracle package skills and technology
abilities. Acquiring the Continuous
Improvement Center enabled Answer-
Think to enhance its benchmarking
expertise.
Last month, the company also
acquired Summit Consulting Group in
Miami, a provider of technology strat-
egy and implementation services.
Terms of the sale were not disclosed.
Frank said he anticipates more deals
within the next 60 days, such as a
partnership with major Year 2000
solution providers and a major acqui-
sition of one of the world's leading
experts in functional improvement
services and benchmarking.
AnswerThink's business services
are focused around the functions of a
corporation's chief financial officer,
sales and marketing czar and the
chief information officer. Its special-
ties are knowledge management, net-
work and systems integration, pack-
age integration for Oracle and
PeopleSoft, data warehouse technolo-
gy and Internet, Year 2000 and elec-
tronic commerce solutions.
"We believe that most companies are
becoming extended enterprises,"
Frank said. "If you asked us to imple-
ment an Oracle package, it's not just
that we're implementing it for you as
a client, but also understanding that
S E P T E M B5E. 1
R1 , 1 9 9 7
Oracle might have to talk to somebody
else's PeopleSoft system."
AnswerThink has adopted this mul-
tidimensional approach to position
itself apart from its competitors,
Frank said. Consulting firms must
deliver information and systems capa-
bilities to businesses that are geo-
graphically dispersed and possibly
spread across numerous different
trading partners.
Frank believes AnswerThink's com-
petitors offer only pieces of that
approach. None are focusing on
extended enterprises as the core of
their business,he said.
Frank added that the theories his
company has developed about the
nature of consulting will soon be
accepted into the mainstream and that
other frrms will copycat its approach.
"We're not just providing value in
the marketplace but also creating a
workplace and an environment that
breeds intellectual excellence and
value," he said.
The company is also busy building a
15,000-square-foot technology center
on the fourth floor of 100 W. Elm St.,
Conshohocken. That's the same build-
ing in which it is temporarily leasing
space, said Frank. Its new offrces are
expected to be completed in November.
Although AnswerThink's founders
are proud of their prior accomplish-
ments at KPMG, Frank said they have
no regrets striking out on their own to
build an organization. Said Frank:
"Isn't capitalism wonderful?" .
PA 19106(215) 238-1450.