Split off from PricewaterhouseCoopers and grown from there
Significant has been active as an independent consultancy and research bureau since 1 January 2003.

Before that, since 1988, we were a consultancy group within PricewaterhouseCoopers (and its predecessors). We are proud of this background because being part of a large organisation that operates worldwide taught us how to think and act across the boundaries of the disciplines, to follow market developments closely and to respond to them appropriately.

Over the years, we have grown into a tightly knit and professional group of about 50 consultants who support organisations in numerous fields and have built up a leading position in the Netherlands in the areas in which the company is active.

Significant was founded by Bert Karssen, Jan Telgen and Rob Veeke.

Bert Karssen
Bert is a mathematician, handling the development of the healthcare purchasing field. He has supported numerous health insurers in professionalisation in this area. The combination of quantitative expertise and knowledge of (healthcare) purchasing has made him a champion of the well-founded and responsible introduction of market mechanisms in healthcare. Bert also specialises in leading methodologically and politically/organisationally complex policy studies with a quantitative component. Other roles have included leading a bonuses and discounts study (1999) and studies for the parliamentary commission of enquiry for the construction sector into national government tendering practices over the period from 1995 to 2001.

Jan Telgen
Jan is an econometrist who moved via logistics into specialising in purchasing management. Since 1987 he has been a professor (part time) at the University of Twente, where he holds the chair in Purchasing Management and Decision Theory. Both for Significant and at the university, he has a strong preference for working with the public sector: social involvement and public accountability are major stimuli in his work.

Rob Veeke
Rob, whose background is in management studies, has supported large and medium-sized national and international organisations since 1990 in the optimisation of their supporting processes, including purchasing, logistics and facility management. The support he provides is focused on the development of strategies and visions, drawing up the timetables for change and assisting organisations in the realisation of these timetables.