Exclusive: KPMG reorgs AI division to create new incubator — with a new executive role reporting directly to the CEO

KPMG LLP is folding its AI, innovation and ecosystem functions into a single new unit designed to spin up AI-native businesses at start-up speed, installing a vice chair who reports directly to the firm’s chief executive to run it — a structural bet that the biggest disruption to the professional-services model in a century can’t be managed through the usual committee layers.

The U.S. audit, tax and advisory firm’s new Client Technology & Innovation (CT&I) group, effective Sept.

22, will be led by Todd Lohr, a 15-year KPMG veteran who told Fortune that he had been “pushing for something like this for several years” — specifically, a structure with “a singular leader that reports directly to the CEO, which I do, because that is how we’re going to drive the transformative change that is required at KPMG.” CT&I’s launch coincides with the departure of Steve Chase, vice chair and global head of AI & Digital Innovation, who is set to retire from the firm on Sept.

30.

Chase built KPMG’s original AI and Digital Innovation group starting in 2023 and has more recently held a KPMG International mandate as Global Head of AI, a role he moved into in August 2025.

That reporting line elevates AI and innovation strategy out of the layer of vice chairs and functional heads and puts it in the same room as CEO Tim Walsh’s own agenda, signaling that KPMG views this less as a technology upgrade than a net new group focused on building what the firm will sell in the future “There are things in the future that are, you know, a little existential for any organization, including our own,” Lohr said, “but I certainly think that we are sitting at this kind of pivotal moment in history, where we’re going to be able to take advantage of some of these swings in the market, and be able to look very differently at the future of KPMG, which is super exciting.” Why now, and why Lohr Lohr, 49, is not an outside hire brought in to inject Silicon Valley DNA.

An internal operator who has spent years building the exact relationships CT&I is designed to commercialize, he helped start the firm’s early data and AI practices, ran its U.S. technology business including cyber, then moved into a role overseeing third-party technology partnerships before a stint leading the firm’s clients-and-markets commercial organization.

Lohr was one of the leaders involved with architecting KPMG’s alliance with Anthropic .

Along with the Anthropic tie-up, existing relationships with Google Cloud, Microsoft , OpenAI and Databricks all now roll into CT&I’s ecosystem mandate.

His path to KPMG is a bit unusual for Big Four leadership.

Before joining the firm, Lohr was employee No.