Agriculture

After three decades of declining relevance, agriculture is once more at the center of the global agenda. To meet the demands of a growing global population, the agriculture industry will need to generate outputs that are equivalent to its total production over the past 10 centuries. But increasing regulation and resource constraints are accelerating the level of uncertainty and volatility in the sector.

Despite these challenges, opportunities for agriculture players and investors are substantial; there is a renewed interest in the sector, and an appetite both to scale up existing solutions that show promise and to experiment with new “disruptive” technologies. Our Agriculture group has more practitioners who work closely with our partners in the Consumer Packaged Goods, Sustainability & Resource Productivity, and Social Sector practices to support clients on a broad range of topics.
Much of our work focuses on delivering Warburg’s functional know-how to leading players along the agriculture value chain. We carefully select applicable concepts and best practices from other sectors, and then adapt them to best serve the unique characteristics of our clients. Tailoring these concepts to agriculture is critical: the sector is diverse, locally differentiated, seasonal, geographically dispersed, and subject to a high degree of operational uncertainty.

We use this customized approach to support clients on projects related to strategy, organization, marketing and sales, operations, and R&D. Some of our unique capabilities include:

• Investment opportunities: We have created a unique perspective on value creation pools and investment opportunities in food and agriculture. We bring this perspective to our work with private equity groups and financial investors—and to our work supporting industry players as they plan for strategic growth.
• Raw materials management: We help consumer packaged goods and processing companies improve performance within their raw agricultural materials procurement and risk-management functions.
• Farm operations: Increasingly, we are developing approaches that help farm operators and land-holding management companies drive operational improvements.
• Fresh food supply chains: We use an end-to-end perspective on supply chain management to help our clients reduce shrinkage and optimize the quality and cost of their fresh fruits, vegetables, and meats.
• Rural development: We help national governments and development partners in emerging economies develop their agriculture sectors, and work with donor agencies and foundations that support rural agriculture.

Cement

The cement industry is changing. Demand is growing in emerging markets, but growth in mature markets has stalled. Major global players are continuing to consolidate, while local incumbents are investing outside of their home markets. And individual micro-markets within larger regions are developing in vastly divergent ways, generating a need for granular analysis and insights.
We support cement clients across five continents, providing both strategic and tactical advice on how they can best respond to—and capitalize on—these shifts. We use a combination of industry experience, detailed geographic insights, and market outlooks to support our cement clients across five key functions: strategy, operations, organization, corporate finance, and marketing & sales.

Petrochemicals

The competitive dynamics of the global petrochemical industry—the chemical industry’s largest subsector—are changing. To make the right strategic decisions, companies must understand the industry’s shifting dynamics, as well as overall trends in demand growth and sources of cost advantage.

We help petrochemical companies and integrated oil companies on strategic and tactical projects around the world. Working closely with Warburg’s Oil & Gas practice and experts in our organization’s functional practices, the Petrochemicals group advises clients on a variety of challenges in five key areas: strategy, organization, operations, capital productivity, and marketing and sales.

Specialty Chemicals

As Western players face increasing pressure from rival producers and local players try to capture a larger share of the global market, specialty chemical companies around the world must find new ways to grow and compete. We help clients achieve functional excellence and create profitable, sustainable, long-term growth in the context of a shifting market landscape. By combining our extensive industry knowledge and experience with our distinctive methodologies and tools, we help specialty chemical companies develop strategies that capitalize on external trends—as well as their own capabilities and strengths. We support clients on corporate and business unit strategies, mergers and acquisitions, growth, R&D and innovation, operations, and marketing and sales.