UK – Media owner Maiden Outdoor awarded multi-manager Investment Solutions a 10 million-pound (14.8 million-euro) global mandate to manage British Transport Advertising’s closed defined-benefit pension fund.

Investment Solutions, which launched in the UK in September, said the mandate was to be put into global equities and fixed income investments, including corporate bonds.

It said the ‘Investment Solutions’ model provides pension funds with “flexibility, to alter asset allocation as the scheme matures”.

Investment Solutions’ global business development director, Justin Taurog, explained that this enabled pension funds and their consultants to work together with the asset manager.

“We continue doing a research of all our managers, which is very much part of the process, but what’s different is that we also offer a lot of flexibility to the scheme,” he said.

Ian Powell, Maiden’s finance director, said: “The multi-manager approach enables our pension trustees to meet increasingly stringent performance measurement demands, releasing them to focus on the scheme members’ needs.”

New members of the pension scheme will be offered a defined contribution package, Taurog said.

British Transport Advertising was taken over by Maiden in 1995.

Investment Solutions is part of South Africa-based Alexander Forbes, which also owns UK actuary Lane Clark & Peacock.

Meanwhile, the Association for Institutional Multi-Manager Investing said UK institutional assets of its members rose by one billion pounds in 2003, or 59 “new institutional client relationships”.

Topics