EUROPE – Northern Trust has named Ben Williams-Thomas as vice president responsible for custody sales to European pension funds.

It said he joins from JP Morgan Investor Services where he was a vice president in European sales and marketing.

It has also hired Marc Russell-Jones and Michael Slater from the Bank of New York and HSBC Institutional Fund Services respectively.

Russell-Jones becomes VP responsible for sales to investment managers, focusing on alternative asset administration business development. Slater becomes VP, responsible for custody and asset administration sales to Middle East and North African markets.

“This is an exciting time for Northern Trust as we expand our asset servicing sales team in Europe, the Middle East and Africa,” said Anne-Lise Winge, Northern’s head of EMEA sales.

“This is in line with our strategy to both remain focused on our traditional client base of pension funds and to dedicate more resource to targeting the investment manager segment where we continue to see significant demand for our services.”

Last week Northern Trust Global Investments said it had been awarded €1.2bn by Mediolanum Asset Management.