Nebraska accounting firms Fred A. Lockwood & Co. and Eskam & Eskam CPAs have merged, effective Jan. 1, 2017.

The combined firm will operate under the name E&H Certified Public Accountants and Management Consultants. FALCO has been based in Scottsbluff, while Eskam & Eskam is based in Gering, Nebraska. The combined firm will move to a new office in Scottsbluff in the middle of the year. The principals of the new firm will be Darrell G. Eskam and Troy L. Hilyard of the Lockwood firm.

Both men began discussing the combination last April, according to a local news site, the Scottsbluff Star Herald. Eskam has a history working with FALCO while he was an intern during his junior college years.

Hilyard plans to drop FALCO’s old audit practice while expanding the firm to add Eskam’s exit planning and business valuation services.

Michael Cohn, editor-in-chief of AccountingToday.com, has been covering business and technology for a variety of publications since 1985.