CIVITTA established a strong position in the Finnish management consulting market in only two years

Started as an alliance among Baltic consultancies, CIVITTA quickly expanded over the past years to CEE and, more recently, Northern Europe. With the second anniversary of CIVITTA Finland and the most recent addition of CIVITTA Denmark, we talked with Tuomas Virtanen, Partner in Finland, about the presence in the Nordics and future plans.

 

What are the factors that contributed to the company’s success on the Finnish market?

The fairly mature Finnish management consulting market has responded well to CIVITTA's challenger approach — it seems companies are welcoming a new player with a fact-based, pragmatic and flexible approach to solving their most critical business problems. 

Our capability to serve companies of all sizes — from pre-revenue startups to largest stock-listed corporations — has been a key factor in growth both at client side and at recruitment markets. On a practical level, we started the expansion with a small yet very active senior team that has helped a lot in spreading the gospel about us around town. We have now served 25 Nordic clients over 50 projects, reaching a revenue of 700k EUR in the last 12 months.

Likewise, our unique capabilities of helping companies succeed in the Eastern European markets and providing high quality data analytics services have helped in differentiation and generating interest, subsequently opening doors for our local team to deliver exceptional value for our clientele. 

 

What kind of challenge do local projects present?

Biggest challenge, unsurprisingly, has been to get clients to trust the 'new kid on the block' and get the first projects in. After breaking that barrier, clients have witnessed our exceptional value-added and getting the next projects has been then much easier. I am very thankful for the trust and opportunities given by our clients.

 

Can you tell about the most interesting projects completed over these two years?

Oh, there is a ton of interesting work and hard to pick favorites. Our team has really enjoyed it all — whether it is helping startups take the next growth leap or supporting stock-listed corporations to test and drive up their new business initiatives. My personal highlights have been working with commercialization of ICT company's AI capabilities and strategy development around renewable energy.

 

Can you elaborate on the strengths that CIVITTA brings to the table in Scandinavian markets?

We are the #1 consulting company in many of the Eastern European markets and that local market knowledge and contact network has been appealing to Scandinavian companies especially in FMCG, retail, energy, construction and industrial sectors. The leading local market position has also enabled us to recruit and grow top talent especially within data analytics — capabilities that are highly sought after by Nordic corporations.

 

What are your plans for the next year in Finland?

Maintaining our rapid growth rate is the key priority for the next few years. Behind this it is quite 'business as usual': continue delivering exceptional quality and build clients through that, be active in all forms of marketing to spread word about CIVITTA to new contacts and strengthen our local team at all seniority levels.

 

Where do you see CIVITTA internationally 5 years from now?

Good start in Finland has proven to us that the concept of fact-based and pragmatic problem-solving can be utilized to challenge the traditional market players, and I expect us to successfully replicate a similar approach in other Nordic countries over the next five years.

 

If you would like to get in touch with our experts in Finland, drop us a line.