KPMG’s New Global Leader Infuses Firm With AI, Operations Savvy

KPMG’s incoming global leader has a track record boosting fees and stewarding mergers among the Big Four accounting and advisory network’s smallest affiliates—experience that will serve the firm as AI and increasing competition threaten to shake up its business model.

Gary Wingrove, the CEO and chairman-elect of KPMG International confirmed by the firm’s global council Wednesday, nearly doubled revenue and headcount in eight years as the top executive for the network’s Australian unit. As the chief operating officer of KPMG’s global arm, he oversaw its AI-adoption campaign and consolidation of dozens of smaller affiliates into regional hubs.

“Nothing quite gives reassurance like a platform where somebody has in a very short period of time increased operational efficiencies” along with “tremendous” revenue growth, said James Cox, a corporate and securities law professor at Duke Law School.

Gary Wingrove was elected as the next global chairman and CEO of KPMG International, the Big Four network said Wednesday.

Photo courtesy of KPMG International

Wingrove, a qualified chartered accountant, led KPMG Australia until 2021 before taking on his current chief operating officer role. Top partners nominated him for the promotion earlier this month.

“KPMG is a people-first business,” Wingrove said in a statement Wednesday after his formal approval, pledging to ensure clients are able to tap their expertise while also benefiting from AI-backed solutions.

He’s set to start his four-year term Oct. 1, KPMG said Wednesday, taking over from retiring CEO Bill Thomas, who boosted revenue by more than half over his nine-year run as global leader.

KPMG reported the fastest annual growth among its peers the last two consecutive years, with revenue rising 5.1% to $39.8 billion last year.

Global Priorities

Big Four global CEOs serve as brand ambassadors with clients, regulators, and even staff. But they also play an important role harmonizing priorities and investments across scores of locally-owned affiliates across the world.

Like its peers, KPMG has invested billions to put cutting-edge artificial intelligence into the hands of its professionals and to deliver AI-based services to clients. AI is already leaving a mark on the professional services industry altering delivery, pricing, and staffing models.

AI is “arguably the biggest development in decades and it’s going to have a huge impact on the way KPMG and other firms serve their clients,” said Jerry Maginnis, a former KPMG office managing partner and a senior adviser to Centri Business Consulting LLC.

Efficiency gains from AI will require fewer entry-level staff. In a few years, that will lead to fewer managers and eventually fewer candidates to buy into the partnership.

As talent strategies shift, firm leaders must also grapple with how to train junior staff to tackle more complex work sooner in their careers. That training must also prepare them for future roles as managers and leaders—without overloading them, said Gia Chevis, associate department chair for accounting and business law at Baylor University.

“How are we going to keep people from burning out quicker,” Chevis said. “You can’t just keep shoehorning in more complex work into a ‘sufficient’ number of hours in a day.”

Consolidation, Competition

KPMG and its peers also operate in an increasingly competitive environment, adding to the challenges Wingrove will face as global leader, Maginnis said.

Private equity investments have fueled rapid consolidation among middle market firms. None yet rival the size of KPMG, the smallest of the top four firms that are viewed as too big to be tempted by third-party capital.

Still the advent of outside ownership and consolidations have altered the landscape for professional services. Even the Big Four firms, which dominate the market, are not immune.

Wingrove led the firm’s efforts to boost audit compliance and expand services by combining small affiliates into larger hubs.

In 2024, KPMG’s UK affiliate merged with its Swiss arm in a merger meant to improve profits and “future proof” the business. RSM and private equity-backed Grant Thornton Advisors have similarly been combining affiliates around the world.