For a little more than three years, Integration provided services for the British government through an initiative to help Latin American companies expand their businesses into the UK. By implementing a broad and concerted effort to entice and counsel more than 500 companies through 150 events, Integration helped achieve a market valuation of new business in the UK estimated at nearly $R900 million. To read the full article from Isto É Dinheiro in Portuguese, including about the Management Consultancies Association awards the effort achieved and Integration’s recent ranking in the Financial Times.

The version below is a translation from the original Portuguese article:

The Brazilian who won over the queen – ISTO É DINHEIRO

Why Carlos Lima, founder of Integration Consulting, made history in the United Kingdom with almost R$900 million in investments from Latin America

Strategic: Carlos Lima, from Integration, was able to attract small and medium sized companies that had never thought of investing in the United Kingdom (Credit:) Gabriel Reis)

The traditional annual ranking of the best management consultancies in the UK, elaborated by the newspaper Financial Times, in partnership with the data company Statista, was met with celebration in a São Paulo office located thousands of miles away from London. Disclosed at the end of January, it featured the Brazilian consultancy Integration. It was the only Brazilian consultancy among the 29 categories, highlighted in the relationship, sales and clients and compliance, risks and finance segments, next to multinationals such as Accenture, EY, KPMG and PwC. To acquire such prestige, Integration worked tirelessly during the last three years to attract companies from Latin America to open their operations in the Queen’s land.

Last year, 26 Latin American companies opened branches in the UK. This expansion is almost nine times the historical average and two to three times the new entries in a single year, up until 2015. With a particularity: companies from Brazil and Mexico were not included in this list, because this contact is carried out directly through the Embassies. “We carefully elaborated a well-designed plan, country by country, to identify who the potential companies were,” says Carlos Lima, founder and president of Integration. “Then, we had to worry about the quality of the delivery, with a more technical bias regarding the rules.”

Integration reached the United Kingdom through a public bidding. The country has a comprehensive and broad program to attract foreign capital and promotion of its market in other countries, through the Department for International Trade (DIT – equivalent to the Ministry of Industry, Foreign Commerce and Services, in Brazil). With the main commercial partners, this work is carried out in partnership with the Embassies. For the smaller countries, the DIT opens a bidding to search for specialists. In 2014, the Brazilian consultancy won this bidding and became responsible for all of Latin America, except Brazil and Mexico. It would be the first time that Integration, founded in 1995, would work on a project for the public sector. “We had to learn how to prepare a proposal and the documentation, since we chose to stay away from this risk in Brazil,” Lima affirms.

[From dawn to dusk: the autonomous golf cart, created by the Argentinean company Baro Vehicles, is powered by solar energy. Now, the company is perfecting this technology in the United Kingdom]

All the countries in the region were studied, but Integration concentrated its efforts on companies from Argentina, Chile and Colombia, in addition to Peru and Uruguay. More than 150 events were organized for more than 500 companies, for them to understand the advantages of investing in the United Kingdom and to detail the entire bureaucratic process of opening a business there. Besides the internal consumer market, reduced taxes and facilities for innovation companies, there was the attractiveness of the company being the entryway to the European Union (something that was undefined after the Brexit).

Curiously, the country of Brexit wants to attract as many foreigners as possible. But only those with capital. At the end of last year, almost R$ 900 million had entered the country through the Brazilian consultancy, who receives a small fixed payment and a percentage of the investment volume. “Latin America has never been more explored by the United Kingdom and the position of the emerging countries, in terms of investment attraction, was very low,” says Guido Solari, who is responsible for Integration operations in the Southern Cone. “We provided pro-active support for Latin American companies to stop thinking that this new market was expensive, difficult and not very competitive.”

Of the total of 51 companies that began investing in the United Kingdom, the main sectors that entered were those in information technology, creative economy, fintech and food and beverages (check out some examples in the table at the end of the article). An interesting case is the Argentinean company Baro Vehicles, who manufactures autonomous electric golf carts, made of carbon fiber and powered by solar energy. The company is practically a startup, created in 2015 in the city of Santa Fé. Baro needed to establish itself in a more industrialized market and the Brazilian consultancy showed it all the support the United Kingdom government would give to receive the investment. The Argentinean company invested R$ 46.2 million in its unit, close to the Jaguar factory, in Mira Technology Park, a development research area for the automotive industry. “Our company develops the entire chassis in Argentina and the technology in the United Kingdom, due to the simplicity for import, the export processes and the specific knowledge on autonomous vehicles,” says Gabriel Giani, CEO of Baro Vehicles.

With 300 professionals spread across offices in seven countries, Integration supports 500 companies worldwide, among them accounts for Diageo, Red Bull and L’Oréal. Besides the prestige of being nominated as one of the best consultancies in the United Kingdom, Integration’s ultimate achievement took place last year in the MCA awards, considered the Oscars of the consulting sector in the country. Of the 140 projects evaluated, the Brazilian company won first place in the Change in the Public Sector category. Most importantly, however, was the Project of the Year Award, an honor which, for the first time in the 20 years of the award’s existence, was given to a Brazilian enterprise. With the Queen’s honors.

HEATHROW CONNECTION
Some Latin American companies that the Brazilian consultancy Integration brought to the United Kingdom

COMPANY: Baro Vehicles
COUNTRY: Argentina
SECTOR: Automotive
INVESTMENT: R$46.2 million

COMPANY: Capitania
COUNTRY: Chile
SECTOR: Financial
INVESTMENT: R$7.3 million

COMPANY: Malos Habitos
COUNTRY: Argentina
SECTOR: Retail
INVESTMENT: R$1.6 million

COMPANY: Naïf Drinks
COUNTRY: Chile
SECTOR: Beverages
INVESTMENT: R$1.5 million

COMPANY: M2M Telecom
COUNTRY: Colombia
SECTOR: Telecommunications
INVESTMENT: R$1.4 million

Source: companies