When EU regulation introduced the mandatory rotation of auditors for public interest entities almost ten years ago, Deloitte was overshadowed in Germany – at least as far as the Dax mandates were concerned. The auditing and consulting firm – number 4 in Germany and the global market leader – did not have a single Dax client at the time. Expectations were high that the legally mandated change of auditor would finally give the company a stronger foothold. After all, Deloitte had already audited the chemical group BASF and the fertiliser specialist K+S in the past. They therefore had a track record.

The head of Germany at the time had set ambitious targets for market share from the outset, but progress was slower than planned, and Deloitte was sometimes mocked by the competition for the gap between ambition and reality. In order to deploy resources in a measured manner, Deloitte consciously took part in tenders with the aim of winning so-called lighthouse mandates in certain sectors. But here, too, patience was required.

Over the past two years, mandate have finally come thick and fast. With nine in the Dax40, Deloitte is now in second place behind top dog PwC, and just ahead of rival KPMG – which had largely shared the field with PwC in the past.

This is a great success for Deloitte, especially as the company has not been successful with smaller Dax companies, but with market heavyweights such as Bayer, Deutsche Telekom, Deutsche Post DHL, and most recently BASF and RWE.

And even for all its success in the auditing business, Deloitte can boast that it has also made great strides in its core consulting business in recent years. Most recently, the consulting business also achieved a double-digit increase in turnover. Not quite as strong as in auditing, but from a significantly higher base.