When Leo Höppel, Michael Schmidt and Hielke Ytsma started back in 2016 with what is today their own company [sync]^² (=SyncSquared), they didn’t know that they were about to invent a new, alternative model to evaluate and predict the performance of companies. It was simply that they didn’t find any existing system that they could apply for their MBA thesis that would help them factoring in what they find most important in any equation of assessing business performance: “How close are you as a company to meet your customer’s expectations!”

Looking into the strategic value disciplines
Choosing Customer Intimacy as main focus was obvious for them as the customer’s voice seemed to be underrepresented in most consultancy methods while the other two disciplines (Product Leadership, Operational Excellence) were exploited to a high extent. However, doing so they found a lot of models predominantly dealing with sole customer centricity. In their view not enough to determine true Customer Intimacy and create value at their clients.

AI powered 360-degree business consulting
“Based on our professional experience and many of the learnings from the MBA, we started sketching our own model, a 360-degree in-depth look into how a company and its environment performs – with the customer in the center of attention! Or how we call it, the [sync]^² Model”, emphasizes Hielke Ytsma, Partner and Lead Competitive Intelligence at [sync]^². It is a data-based AI model which validates and cross-interprets numerous sources from the four core areas - business, customer, performance, trends. Combined with a profound qualitative evaluation of all four areas, this results in compelling and novel insights into the performance and growth potential of a company.

Artificial intelligence as an interpretive key
Leo Höppel, Partner and Lead Data Analytics at [sync]^²: “We realized early on that we needed a strong digital foundation to deliver value-adding results quickly and accurately to our customers. That ultimately led us to AI". Together with business analysts, data scientists, and business intelligence experts, [sync]^² developed what was obvious to them: artificial intelligence, or more precisely, a machine learning system that allows them to collect, interpret, and use a large amount of data. As one of their proprietary key performance indicators, [sync]^² calculates the "Customer Intimacy Score" (CIS), which allows in-depth conclusions about a company and has a direct correlation to the company's revenue.

ROI: Increased Customer Intimacy Score boosts revenue
Now, this new approach to business valuation and development is rapidly delivering tangible results. "For every increase in the CIS, our customer achieves a clearly defined top-line improvement. That is our promise!" explains Michael Schmidt, Partner and Lead Markets & Trends at [sync]^². To quickly achieve this benefit for all customers, [sync]^² has developed its highly efficient, data-driven method of rapidly developing and bringing their customers' CIS forward! This is one of the reasons why [sync]^² aggregates great interest among customers from a wide variety of industries today. “The goal: to really know what my customers want hence to offer products and services that sell. The increase of turnover and market share is then the logical consequence."

First results in 10 days
"Looking at classic consulting offerings, we quickly realized that today's businesses have little time and money to slow down their own staff by accompanying consultants over months while waiting for first results. That was one more reason why we have developed a digitally enhanced model that delivers fast, substantial results; Data-based, transparent and reproducible," adds Schmidt. From [pulse]^² - the fast "pulse-check" defining the proximity of a company (10 days) to [analytics]^² - the deep 360-degree analysis of a business and its environment (20 days) to [continuum]^² - the licensable continuous improvement process tailored to very needs of a client (3-18 months), the comprehensive [sync]^² Consulting Offering is adding value to all kind of client projects."Always with the goal of quickly and sustainably increasing our customers' revenue."

About [sync]^²: Leo Höppel, Michael M. Schmidt and Hielke Ytsma have built [sync]^² as a spin-off from the Professional MBA Automotive Industry (TU Wien). During the course of their MBA, they partnered to develop a new angle in business assessment and consulting – the [sync]^² model. All 3 coming from different professional backgrounds – Business, Consulting and Technology – they are adding a profound mix of academic and managerial background encompassing leading management and executive roles in automotive, IT, transportation, energy, the consulting, service and marketing range of businesses to super sportscars and Formula1. SyncSquared AG is headquartered in Switzerland and has partner offices in the Netherlands and Austria. For more information visit: http://www.syncsquared.com, opens an external URL in a new window