DDB lands £69m Deloitte account

Deloitte Consulting, the management consulting division of professional services firm Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, has appointed DDB Worldwide to its $100m (£69m) worldwide branding account.

The agency, which pitched against Wieden & Kennedy, will promote Deloitte Consulting’s new identity when it separates from the parent company later this year.

The European work will be overseen by DDB’s London office. Nine other DDB offices will be involved in the account.

The account will involve distancing Deloitte Consulting from Deloitte & Touche, the accountancy arm, by introducing a new name and branding. Last month, Deloitte Consulting appointed Interbrand’s American office to create a new identity along with marketing agency Creative Capital.

Auditors and their consulting businesses have been stigmatised by the Enron/Andersen scandal earlier in the year. PricewaterhouseCoopers’ consulting arm is also understood to be talking to branding agencies ahead of flotation later this year.

Deloitte Consulting’s rebranding will underline that its services are not related to the accountancy business in the same way that Andersen Consulting was renamed Accenture in 2000 to distance itself from Andersen.

Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu employs 95, 000 people in 140 countries, and in the year to 31 May 2001 earned $12.4bn (£8.5bn) in fees.