EY’s global boss will step down from his post next year.
(Photo: EY)
Dusseldorf The global boss of the auditing and consulting firm EY, Carmine Di Sibio, has announced his retirement. This was confirmed by business circles to the Handelsblatt on Tuesday. Di Sibio will remain on board until June 2024 and will lead the company during the transition phase until a new boss takes over. The successor is still open. There was no official notification of the withdrawal as of early Tuesday evening.
The 60-year-old American recently suffered a serious defeat: last year he started splitting the company into two independent consulting and auditing groups. However, the “Everest” project failed in the spring due to serious differences in the partnership over the design.
The original plan was for Di Sibio to set up this project successfully and then retire. The Board of Directors of EY has extended its term of office by two years, which should actually end at the end of June 2023. Now he is leaving a year earlier than planned.
EY: New attempt at split seems possible
It had been expected in industry and corporate circles that Di Sibio would no longer remain in office full-time after the failure of “Everest”. There it was said that EY could certainly make a new attempt at the separation in the coming years – but then only under new management, who had to convince the partners of the project.
In April, the statement on the failure of “Everest” said that EY was stopping the project and wanted to fundamentally re-discuss it. However, a new attempt was not explicitly ruled out.
>> Read also: “Disappointment and incomprehension”: failed split shocked EY in Germany
The split project cost EY a good $600 million. It envisaged the spin-off of all consulting businesses into a new entity with a new name, which would then be taken public. That would have brought the consulting partners millions in payouts and should provide the company with enough capital for acquisitions and talent recruitment.
Sunk
600
million dollars
has cost EY the failed split project.
The auditors would have remained under the EY brand. Di Sibio wanted to make the separation a model in the industry, in which consultants and auditors traditionally work together under one roof. In doing so, EY primarily wanted to free tax and management consulting from restrictions imposed by regulatory authorities. EY has become the focus of supervisors in Germany, mainly due to its role in the Wirecard scandal.
Di Sibio defends split plans
However, the partners in the USA could not agree on a division of human resources. Because the audit unit must also be equipped with sufficient tax consultants and experts for cybercrime or forensics (white-collar crime) in order to remain competitive. Competitors Deloitte, KPMG and PwC had stated that they were not aiming for such a split.
The courage we have shown has set the entire industry on a new course that will only be revealed in the years to come. EY boss Carmine di Sibio according to “FT” in an internal call
“I’m proud of the bold vision we pursued with Project Everest,” Di Sibio said in an internal executive call on Tuesday, according to the British Financial Times. “The courage we have shown has set the entire industry on a new course that will only be revealed in the years to come. We challenged the status quo, we asked tough questions and we were bold in our ambitions.”
A candidate for his successor is the US boss of EY, Julie Boland. It leads the largest and most important national company. However, the audit expert made a significant contribution to the failure of the “Everest” project. The replacement of the post should also be a directional decision about the future structure.
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