Allspring CEO targets culture and solid investment platform

Allspring does not offer some of the racier alternative asset classes, specialising instead in the core building blocks of asset allocations. Perhaps, therefore, it is no surprise that the firm is keen to emphasise its own organisational culture: Allspring has, after all, built an asset management brand from scratch following a well-publicised mis-selling scandal in the latter 2010s at its former parent Wells Fargo.  

The fallout from that was the catalyst for the San Francisco-based bank to announce the divestment of its asset management arm in February 2021 in a $2.1bn (€1.8bn) deal to private equity players GTCR and Reverence Capital Partners (the firm is also 20% employee owned). Wells Fargo Asset Management was rebranded Allspring Global Investments in November of the same year. 

The newly-minted firm also hired Legg Mason veteran Joe Sullivan to be CEO and chair. He then became executive chair in 2025, handing the CEO position over to Kate Burke, whom Sullivan had brought in as president in 2023. The two have worked together to orchestrate much change, and Burke speaks highly of their professional partnership.

“Before, while we were partnering on things, we had different levels of focus,” Burke explains. “I was more internally focused in the first two years, really looking at our investment platform, really looking at our operational platform, and Joe was much more on the client side.”

A key difference now is that Burke has much greater involvement with clients.

She continues: “What I found interesting in terms of the opportunity is that Allspring as an investment platform for me had many of the building blocks you wanted across the different fixed income, equity, multi asset, systematic sleeves – many great investment teams – yet has a unified investment platform where you could go to market cohesively with that full spectrum.”

The second attraction, Burke says, was the opportunity to build without too much legacy.

Platform redesign

Allspring exited a transaction services agreement with Wells Fargo in June 2024, which was a catalyst to start “heavy lifting” to redesign the investment platform. The objective was to create a unified portfolio management infrastructure that independent investment teams could customise to their own needs.

But what does that mean at a granular level? 

Investment teams “choose what their desktop looks like”, as Burke puts it. “They get to choose the tools they want. We can create customised tools for them, but the infrastructure underneath is cleaner than it has been in the past, and we think it will help them find more alpha opportunities, with better speed and insights, more quickly.” 

A next objective is to improve information and research sharing between teams, to leverage intellectual capital, while respecting the autonomy of teams and the likelihood of opposing views.  

“Many asset managers struggle with a lot of legacy systems and a history of just having to do incremental changes,” Burke explains. “We had, through the independence of Allspring, an opportunity and the support of Reverence and GTCR to really redesign the entire operating platform.” 

AI clearly plays a role – here, Burke emphasises the firm’s three-pillar approach. Alongside selecting the right desktop tools for employees, and partnering with the right front-office platforms, she also emphasises the need to invest highly selectively in areas where there is clearly a business case. An example is agentic AI, tools that can complete tasks autonomously and which some asset managers are rolling out to support portfolio management teams. 

“I do believe that there’s a return on invested time of individuals, and if you can identify you’re going to save people time so they can spend more time on higher productivity or higher alpha-driven [models], or higher client-servicing types of models, it’s worth making that investment,” she emphasises. 

Expansion plans

Allspring hired Andy Sowerby, a UK industry veteran, in 2021 as head of international distribution. Internationally, the firm’s footprint is solidly institutional, mainly pensions, but there are ambitions to grow in insurance, and Allspring is rather well established, Burke says. Working with consultants and partnering with sophisticated clients also helps Allspring create customised mandates.    

Burke rules out expanding into private credit. However, the firm has recently acquired the investment team of emerging market credit specialist GIA Partners, led by Eduardo Cortes, who previously ran emerging market debt at JP Morgan Investment Management. 

“Investment team autonomy and strength of conviction in the investment process are really important to us”

What else is on Burke’s acquisition list?  “I would like to have global equity,” she replies. “I wish I had it last year, because I do think there’s a potential rotation into global equity. And while we have a really strong emerging markets platform, and we have one really strong global equity product in our systematic team, it would be great to have something more fundamental there.

“It could be buying a team; it could be building some of it organically; or it could come as part of a larger acquisition, where it’s a part of the rationale.”

Again, cultural fit is paramount: “We’ve spent four-and-a-half years establishing the Allspring culture. We’d be saying, ‘Where are they adding complementary skills?’”

The aim is for a “collaborative culture”, emphasising “credible challenge and teamwork orientation”, Burke says.

“We want that to continue, so having cultural fit and the importance of investment team autonomy and strength of conviction in the investment process are really important to us, but they [investment teams] also have to be willing to collaborate across the platform,” Burke continues.

Before joining Allspring, Burke spent almost 20 years at Alliance Bernstein, starting off in equity research sales and rising to the positions of COO and CFO.

“There’s no doubt I have pulled through my belief [that] fundamental research, deep insights, [and] understanding companies can create an edge in long-term portfolio management and returns. The people side, I think, is really important.”

Pressure around ESG

Like other asset managers, Allspring needs to navigate the vicissitudes of US and European attitudes towards ESG. Burke points to sustainability metrics and data that could affect company performance – the firm makes relevant research available to portfolio management teams through its ESG IQ research and a climate transition framework. Both are seen as important investment considerations.

The flip side is client demand. “That’s where I would say there’s a differentiation right now […] between the continents,” Burke says, although she points to US client demand for a transition investment strategy.

The firm publishes TCFD and sustainability reports, and Burke underlines the firm’s commitment to continuing these. Sustainability and DEI heads are also senior investment leaders.

Burke points out that sustainability and DEI remain important to employees and to the workplace proposition that is needed to attract the best talent. She emphasises that Allspring has shied away from targets, either in diversity or currently contentious areas such as net zero, an approach that now seems mainstream. Had Allspring come into existence as an independent manager a few years earlier it may have adopted a different approach, it seems.

“I try to stay away from strict definitions of words,” Burke explains – DEI can mean different things to different people, after all. “What we really try to orient on is, ‘What are the outcomes that we’re looking for culturally?’” 

She concludes: “What you have to be focused on is what you believe in in terms of how you build a great company and a great culture longer term.” 

Allspring is a private equity-owned asset manager in an industry that is acknowledged to be on a consolidation course. What of its own future? Burke says this is question staff also regularly ask her. 

“There is no pressure on Allspring to do anything that is not in the best interest of building a great business. So, anything we’re doing on the M&A side in terms of our acquisition is driven by us internally, and what we see as our priorities. 

“We’re always cognisant that there could be something that where someone might be interested in us, or where there could be an opportunity to do something together, but it is not a primary focus. It will be an outcome of the success that we have in building Allspring.