KPMG launches PE group

KPMG has formed the U.S. Private Equity Group and named firm veteran Donald Spitzer its national managing partner for private equity.

The moves are part of the accounting firm’s efforts to revamp its structure in a way that it says will alter its ability to serve private equity firms. Perhaps the group’s most significant change is that it has assigned a specific senior partner to each of its private equity clients. So each firm will work with one senior partner who will coordinate all of KPMG’s services for that client. The plan is similar to how KPMG operates in the United Kingdom.

“The key is that someone from a private equity firm is going to be able to call a senior partner,” says Spitzer. “The firm will have a direct line into whatever function is needed to serve that fund. If you talk to the private equity funds, they clearly want a central point of contact. What drove us to the model is that our U.K. firm has been using it for a number of years most effectively.”

KPMG brought over Derek Zissman from its London office to help coordinate the new structure in the United States and serve as director of the new group. New York-based KPMG is one of the largest accounting and transactional service firms worldwide with 93 offices and 19,600 employees in the United States. —Alastair Goldfisher