Major Y2K Advisory Firms Stop Taking New Clients _________________(news)
Link: 204.134.221.30:8898/ows-bin/owa/im_pak.imdecode?link=446
The resources available to fix y2k are running low. Errst & Young, KPMG
Peat Marwick, and Price Waterhouse have all closed access to new y2k
clients.
This is from INTEGRATION MANAGEMENT (Feb. 2).
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Between them, KPMG Peat Marwick and Ernst & Young audit more than
one third of the Fortune 1000 and count many of these companies among
their management consultancy clients.
Yet as these two accountancy giants move toward a proposed merger,
they are offering Year 2000 services only to their top-tier clients while
turning away business from many others.
"A lot of clients are asking for help with Year 2000, but unfortunately we
can't provide it, explains William Ruckle, managing director, Year 2000,
Ernst & Young, We don't have the resources to service everyone. . . .
In this regard, Ruckle's firm is not unlike many of its competitors. While
Ernst & Young is concentrating its Year 2000 capabilities on only 25 major
accounts, KPMG is working almost exclusively with a select group of
large clients with which it has had a long-standing relationship.. . .
These are Fortune 50 companies that pretty much go across most
industries.
Similarly, Price Waterhouse has limited its Year 2000 offerings to a select
group of clients that have requested support. Even Coopers & Lybrand,
which plans to merge with Price Waterhouse and which has been
providing Y2K support since 1993, as of last year had taken on only 54
projects, 15 of which have been completed. The firm expects its Y2K
practice to plateau in 1998 because of capacity constraints. . . .
Many of Ernst & Young and KPMG's clients are U.S. -based
multinationals that have to be concerned about the global ramifications of
Y2K issues, given the interdependency on the global market. Kearny, who
has testified before Congress about the dangerous lack of awareness
regarding Y2K outside the United States, notes that not only do U.S.-based
multinationals have to bring their own non-U.S. operations up to speed,
they need to be sure the foreign banks and suppliers they communicate
with electronically are fully geared up for the millennium.
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This article clearly shows the lack of resources is going to have a stunning effect on the market place and on those companies who still think they can start, or even maintain, projects in-house.
Remember, the bulk of the work hasn't even come in yet.
There is no point in companies buying toolsets from vendors if they can't find the people to use them.
The automated factory approach is their only hope.
The next surge in the y2k arena will be the conversion houses.
It is going to happen, everything is pointing to it, it is only a matter of time.
Stay tuned. |
