Booz Allen Hamilton is an American consulting agency, which provides management and IT consulting services to its clients. The company headquarters is based in McLean, Virginia, U.S., and was founded in 1914, by Edwin G. Booz, James L. Allen, and Carl L. Hamilton. The company name is after the surnames of three founders. Booz Allen is one of the leading consulting firms in America and has also over 80 offices in different parts of the world, including clients from private-public as well as non-profits sectors.
Booz Allen Hamilton has two divisions that provide IT and management services, i.e., Worldwide Commercial Business and Worldwide Technology Business. The former is for providing management services, and the other is to provide technology consulting and system development services to both private as well as government organizations. Booz Allen & Hamilton Health Care Inc and Booz Allen & Hamilton Acquisition Services are the main subsidiary companies of Booz Allen Hamilton.
The Establishment of Booz Allen Hamilton
The company history dates back to over 100 years ago, in 1914, when a company, named Business Research Service, was founded by Edwin G. Booz to provide consulting services to other companies. Booz wanted to build a business model where companies could hire experts for unbiased advice for their businesses, such that to help them grow even better. The business was recognized as one of its kind. Two years later, two other partners, James L. Allen and Carl L. Hamilton joined the company.
Even at the beginning of the company, it was able to grab clients like Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company and Canadian Pacific Railway. For the first thirty years of Business Research Service, it was juggling with a lot of name changes, like Edwin G. Booz, Business Engineering Service, and Business Surveys. George Fry joined the company as the first full-time assistant in 1925 and later, became a partner. In 1936, the company headquarters was moved to Field Building in Chicago. The same year, the company was named Booz, Fry, Allen & Hamilton, but as in 1942, Fry left the company, it became Booz Allen Hamilton.
In 1940, Booz Allen Hamilton bagged a contract from the U.S. Navy such that the company was to assess the preparedness of the Navy for the second world war in terms of the condition of the Navy’s shipyards, telephone systems, and intelligence operations, etc. By the end of the war, the company had established three offices in the major cities like Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles, with around 400 clients on board. Though the war was over, the company continued to offer its services to the US military.
In 1955 Booz Allen Hamilton established the Booz Allen Applied Research, Inc. (BAARINC). The company got recognized as ‘the world’s largest, most prestigious management consulting firm’ by Time magazine in 1959. By this time, IBM, Abbott Labs, and the US Department of the Interior had also become its clients, and the company was making annual revenues worth $55 million.
Booz Allen Hamilton went public in January 1970. In the early 70s, NASA hired the company to evaluate a $100 million satellite to orbit the earth for one year. During the same time, the company also started to work in the telecom and IT field. 1980, the recorded annual revenue for the company was $180 million. To get a hold on the technology market, the company entered the commercial systems integration field in 1989.
By the mid-90s, the company’s operations were restructured and divided into two divisions, i.e., technology services & systems development and commercial management consulting. In 2008, with a spin-off, the commercial arm of Booz Allen Hamilton was separated to form Booz & Company, which later was acquired by PwC. The company had another round of IPO in 2010. By 2020, the company also became the SEC’s major cybersecurity services provider.
International Expansion and Acquisitions
In 1953, the company went international after Booz Allen Hamilton bagged a contract from the Philippines and the Egyptian government. During the same time, the company also opened its office in Italy. The company made some acquisitions like Designers for Industry (renamed Design & Development) and Foster D. Snell Laboratory in the early 60s.
By the end of the 60s, the company had also started to work with several European industries, including the British heavy industry and consumer goods manufacturers and West German and Scandinavian steel producers. During the same time, the company was also actively working with the governments of Brazil, Argentina, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia as well as Venezuela.
In 1972, Booz Allen Hamilton entered the Japanese industry. The company acquired Advanced Decision Systems Inc in 1991, and in 2012, it acquired the Defense Systems Engineering & Support division of ARINC, followed by the acquisition of Epidemico in 2014, S.C. technology firm SPARC in 2015, and eGov Holding in 2017.
The Founder: Edwin George Booz
Edwin George Booz is recognized as the founder of Booz Allen Hamilton as he was the first one to start the company. He was born on 2 September 1887 in Reading, Pennsylvania. He completed a bachelor’s degree in economics and a master’s degree in psychology from Kellogg School at Northwestern University. As soon he completed his education, he started Business Research Service in 1914.
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