PRICEWATERHOUSECOOPERS ADVISORY SPA

Their core work

PwC Advisory SPA is the Italian advisory arm of PricewaterhouseCoopers, one of the world's Big Four professional services firms. In H2020 projects, they contribute management consulting, business model development, impact assessment, and exploitation strategy — bridging the gap between research outputs and market adoption. Their project portfolio covers cloud security governance, smart city standardization, and public service transformation, reflecting PwC's broad advisory capabilities across digital and public sector domains.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

PwC Advisory's H2020 involvement was concentrated in a narrow window (2015–2017 project starts), making it difficult to identify a meaningful evolution. Their earliest projects (SUNFISH, ESPRESSO) leaned toward technical infrastructure topics — cloud security and smart city standards — while their latest project (Co-VAL, running through 2021) shifted toward public administration reform and service design. This suggests a gradual pivot from technology-centric advisory toward governance and public value questions.

Their trajectory moved from technical cloud/smart city topics toward public sector reform, but with no projects after 2017, their current H2020 engagement appears dormant.

How they like to work

PwC Advisory has exclusively participated as a partner, never leading a consortium — consistent with a large consultancy that joins projects to provide advisory expertise rather than drive the research agenda. Despite only three projects, they accumulated 40 unique consortium partners across 15 countries, indicating they joined large, geographically diverse consortia. This is typical of a Big Four firm: they bring credibility and market access but rely on academic and technical partners for core research.

Through just three projects, PwC Advisory connected with 40 partners across 15 countries, reflecting involvement in large pan-European consortia rather than deep bilateral relationships. Their network is broad but shallow in the H2020 context.

What sets them apart

As a Big Four advisory firm, PwC brings unmatched business network access, market credibility, and exploitation capacity that most research-focused H2020 participants cannot offer. Their value lies not in technical research but in translating project results into business cases, policy recommendations, and market strategies. For consortium builders needing a strong dissemination and exploitation partner with corporate reach, PwC is a recognizable and capable choice — though their limited H2020 track record suggests EU research is not a core business line for this entity.

Highlights from their portfolio

• SUNFISH
  Their largest H2020 investment (EUR 318,312), addressing federated cloud security — a topic directly aligned with PwC's cybersecurity advisory practice.
• Co-VAL
  Their longest-running project (2017–2021), focused on transforming public administrations through value co-creation — connecting PwC's public sector consulting to academic research.