Bench­mar­king / Ef­fi­ci­en­cy ana­ly­sis

An objective assessment of the successes of a company's individual divisions or branches clearly shows failures and potential for improvement. Some of the methods that can be used for this purpose are not at all simple, despite the questions often sounding easy: What are the causes of varying profitability? Are sales offices in the country more profitable than those on the outskirts of cities? Which operational size yields the maximum profit or creates minimum costs? How do we need to use resources internally so that the company’s divisions automatically minimise inefficient structures? Which divisions have synergies? We can provide you with answers to these questions based on real-life situations thanks to our data pool and method competence.

The use of efficiency measurements and benchmarking of regulatory aspects helps regulators to determine the permissible profit of a regulated company. The electricity and gas networks in many countries (natural monopolies) are subject to government incentive regulations, which specify the caps for income and profits. Such benchmarks are based on efficiency comparisons, in which the most cost-efficient companies serve as a yardstick. But even the healthcare sector increasingly uses efficiency measurements, particularly to determine the tariffs for services in the outpatient, inpatient and care sectors. 

One-dimensional performance indicators (such as sales per employee, costs per kilometre of rail network) quickly lead to misleading results when comparing companies, business units or branches. Despite providing a good overview of individual production processes, they do not reflect the operational efficiency of the entire company with sufficient reliability. We are convinced that highly reliable conclusions can only be drawn from comparisons with the best by using the differentiated benchmarking methods. 

We specialise in such multi-dimensional methods and develop them on a mathematical and economic basis. Depending on the question, we apply different methods to evaluate the efficiency of the monitored companies or units. To increase the reliability of the findings, we also examine the robustness of the models used. We also analyse the importance of individual cost drivers in the overall company or in individual processes.

Our efficiency and benchmarking calculations can be used for checking and, if necessary, questioning the specifications of the regulatory authorities. Thanks to our long-standing practical experience, we indicate which companies or company units perform better with regard to certain aspects and where there is room for improvement.