Aviva, AXA IM, Isio, MaPS, SEI, Lumera, Skandia, PFA, AP Pension, Formuepleje, Church of England
SEI – Jim London has been named as chief executive officer of SEI Investments (Europe). He will continue to maintain his responsibilities as head of SEI’s UK private banking and wealth management business and will succeed Brett Williams following his retirement, effective 30 June, pending regulatory approval.
With more than 25 years of experience in financial services, London currently serves as chief operating officer for SEI Investments (Europe), overseeing operations, technology, and change management, as well as supporting enterprise risk, resilience, and business continuity planning.
As head of SEI’s UK private banking and wealth management business, he leads the delivery of comprehensive technology and operations solutions for UK wealth managers.
SEI is seeking candidates for the role of COO for SEI Investments (Europe).
Church Commissioners for England – The institution has appointed four new trustees to its board – Remi Olu-Pitan, Kif Hancock, Kate Barker, and Jenny Buck. All are also members of the assets committee, which has oversight of the endowment fund managed by the Church Commissioners.
Olu-Pitan, who was previously a co-opted member of the assets committee’s securities group since July 2020, has also been elected deputy chair of the assets committee for 12 months, supporting Alan Smith, First Church Estates Commissioner and chair of the assets committee.
The board of the Church Commissioners consists of 27 members, including lay people, clergy and bishops, some of whom are elected by the Church’s General Synod, and others who are appointed by the Crown or archbishops following competitive recruitment processes.
Olu-Pitan is the head of multi-asset growth and income strategies at Schroders, where she is responsible for outcome-orientated investments for a variety of global clients.
Hancock is partner and chief investment officer international at Brown Advisory. He leads Brown’s multi-strategy international investment offering for clients, and specialises in third-party manager selection and asset allocation.Barker has enjoyed a successful career in business and policymaking, and was a member of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee from 2001 to 2010.
Buck is the CIO at Tesco Pension Investment Limited, where she manages more than £12bn of assets across equities, fixed income, and private markets, including direct real estate, private equity, private credit, hedge funds, and infrastructure investments.
Lumera – Kerstin Hessius has been appointed to the board of directors of the Swedish insurance technology company. She was CEO of Swedish national pensions buffer fund AP3 for 18 years, until she stepped down at the end of last year.
Hessius has also previously worked as deputy governor of Sweden’s central bank and as CEO of the Stockholm Stock Exchange. She currently sits on the supervisory boards of Handelsbanken and real estate firm Hemsö.
Oxford University Endowment Management – The firm announced two senior appointments to its investment team.
Heinrich Merz joins as managing director from Pictet Alternative Advisors, where he was head of hedge funds since 2017 and a member of the Pictet investment committee. In his role, Merz led fund investments in liquid public equity and credit totalling over $10.7bn.
Heinrich brings over 20 years of experience of investing in these asset classes. Prior to Pictet, Heinrich held various investment roles including CIO at Amundi Alternative Investments, overseeing alternative assets for institutional clients, and deputy CIO at Permal Group.
Peter Maher joins as investment director and brings significant experience advising and managing multi-asset portfolios for charities, family offices and corporates. He was most recently the head of venture capital investing at Legal & General Investment Management from 2021-2023. Prior to that, he spent seven years at Cambridge Associates, where his last position was as head of EMEA private equity and venture capital research. Over this time, he has been responsible for investing approximately $3bn of capital into private markets strategies.
Merz will join in September and Maher will join in July. Both will report to Neamul Mohsin, deputy CIO.
Skandia – Gabriel Lundström has been appointed as the new head of sustainability at the Swedish pension provider. He joins Skandia from his current role as head of ESG at SEB’s pensions arm, where he has worked for the last 10 years.
Lundström is currently chair of the supervisory board of the UN Global Compact’s Swedish operation, and sits on the board of Swedish Sustainable Investment Forum. Skandia said he would start work in the role from 1 September.
PFA – Morten Winther Hansen has been named by the Danish pensions heavyweight as its new group chief operating officer, and has joined the top management team in the role.
Winther Hansen has worked at PFA for 25 years, and comes to the new job – where he will be responsible for operations and development – from a position as director of products and process management, the Copenhagen-based company announced.
He is replacing Mads Kaagaard, who – as announced in February – is leaving the company to become CEO of rival Danica Pension on 1 November this year.
AP Pension/Formuepleje – Rasmus Cederholm is leaving Denmark’s AP Pension where he has been CIO since 2021, having been hired as the new CIO of investment management firm Formuepleje.
At Formuepleje, which has offices in Copenhagen and Aarhus, he will be replacing Henrik Franck, who left the firm at the end of May.
Cederholm is due to start work at his new employer on 1 September, and AP Pension said the CIO would continue working in his current role in the meantime, giving AP Pension time to find a replacement. AP Pension said it was starting the hiring process for a new CIO immediately.
Money and Pensions Service (MaPS) – The UK pensions service has announced that its chief executive officer, Caroline Siarkiewicz, has confirmed to the board that she will not be taking up a second term.
Siarkiewicz was appointed as CEO in January 2020 having been acting CEO since June 2019. She will step down at the end of January 2024 after four years leading the organisation through a period of significant change.
As CEO, Siarkiewicz led MaPS through the early integration of the three separate organisations Money Advice Service (MAS), The Pensions Advisory Service (TPAS) and Pension Wise. Under her leadership, MaPS launched its new MoneyHelper consumer brand, published the first ever UK Strategy for Financial Wellbeing, expanded the reach of MoneyHelper pensions guidance and Pension Wise services and helped more people access the life-changing benefits of expert debt advice.
The search for a successor will commence shortly and will be led by MaPS’ chair, Sara Weller. The appointment will be subject to the approval of the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.
Isio – The UK-based pension consultancy has announced a series of senior appointments as the business continues to expand and diversify its services for clients.
Emily McGuire, who joined Isio from Aon last year, has been appointed to lead its iInvestment advisory team, alongside now being a member of the Exco leadership team.
McGuire takes on the role from Nick Evans, who is turning his focus to client development, exploring new opportunities to diversify and grow the business.
Additional senior promotions have also been made with Laura Higgins and Emma Hudson appointed as partners.
Higgins is head of Isio’s Bristol office. She has been based in the city since the start of her career, which began as an intern at KPMG in 2004. Whilst continuing to head up the 70-strong team in Bristol, she will also lead Isio’s GMP Equalisation proposition.
Hudson joined Isio’s investment advisory team from Mercer two years ago, on the day the firm celebrated its first birthday. She leads the Midlands investment team and has won several new clients since joining Isio. Whilst she provides investment advice to a wide range of clients, she has significant experience of working with larger defined benefit (DB) pension schemes, having advised three £10bn+ schemes in the last few years.
The appointments follow Isio’s announcement that it has completed its acquisition of Deloitte’s Total Reward and Benefits business, cementing its challenger status in the pensions advisory market.
AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM) – The asset management firm has appointed Caroline Portel as global chief operating officer effective 1 July 2023. She will take over from Laurent Caillot who will pursue a new professional endeavour outside of the AXA Group.
Based in Paris, Portel will be a member of the AXA IM management board, reporting to Marco Morelli, executive chair of AXA IM. In this role, she will oversee technology, operations, data management, project management, security procurement, facilities and innovation.
Portel has been programme director at AXA IM since 2022 and is responsible for the integration of the AXA IM Prime and AXA IM Architas business units. Having initially joined AXA in 1999, Portel held senior roles in multiple functions ranging from investor relations to consolidation and reporting in various AXA entities and countries.
Most recently, she was chief financial officer at AXA Global Life, the life reinsurance subsidiary of AXA from 2014 to 2018, and then became CFO of Architas Group and CEO of Architas France until 2019.
Aviva Investors – Monica Fan-Bradley has been appointed as the firm’s head of institutional sales (ex. Asia Pacific) within its global client solutions function.
Fan-Bradley will be responsible for expanding Aviva Investors’ sales activities with global institutional investors across its pensions, official institutions, liquidity and consultant teams, as well as strategic relationships, across the UK, Europe, North America and Middle East. She will report directly to Louise Kay, global head of client solutions.
Fan-Bradley joins Aviva Investors from UBS Asset Management where she spent almost seven years, most recently as managing director and head of global consultant relations. She has more than 25 years of experience working in a variety of senior roles on both the buy- and sell-side of the investment industry, whilst also being a member of eVestment’s asset manager board and the advisory council of The Diversity Project UK.
The appointment is the latest hire to Aviva Investors’ global client solutions capabilities, following the addition of Richard Surrency as head of Asia Pacific, global client solutions, and Shiqi Wang as client solutions director, global client solutions, in November 2022 and April 2023, respectively.
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