Asset Servicers
The Asset Servicing industry plays a critical role in safeguarding assets and supporting the Investment and Fund Operations that underpin the Asset Management industry. Asset Servicers are currently facing a period of unprecedented disruption and opportunity, a period of homogeneity of services is over and leading firms are innovating to succeed.
Asset Managers are under pressure from their clients to demonstrate the value they add, and Asset Servicers are no different. It is imperative to move from ‘selling a commodity, to ‘selling a valuable service’, whilst remaining transparent. Alpha has significant expertise in this area, and we can offer our Asset Servicer clients clear, informed, and cutting-edge solutions.
How we work with clients
The drive to remain competitive whilst differentiating products is creating disruption in the Asset Servicing community. From driving strategic, existential thinking, innovating to combat new operational challenges, and deploying delivery excellence, Alpha is a trusted adviser to Asset Servicers in solving for both local and global initiatives.
Alpha's support spans all Asset Servicer Product lines:
Strategic Growth and Product Accelerators:
- Strategy Definition & Implementation
- Market Entry
- Product Design, Definition, and & Evolution
- Sales and Marketing Efficiency & Technology
- Service & Tariff Benchmarking
Operational Efficiency & Resilience
- Operating Model Design & Implementation
- Automation & Innovation Proof of Concept
- Enterprise Transformation
- Regulatory Analysis & Change Deliveyr
- Post-merger Integrations
Client Support
- Program Delivery Excellence & Assurance
- Transformation & Change Framework
- Client User Experience Analysis
Why Alpha?
We have unrivalled specialist knowledge of Asset Servicing across Operations, Technology, Product, and Change. Critically, we work across the industry’s entire lifecycle from Trading through Settlement and all points in between. As a result, we are in a unique position to see where Asset Servicers need to focus their outlook, advising on, and enabling, attainment of short- and long-term goals.
Q&A with Caoimhe Munif, Director
How can Asset Servicers protect their income streams across product offerings?
Highly commoditised products need to be streamlined to provide healthy margins and to enable the subsidisation of more nascent offerings. Asset Servicers are leveraging wider firm or group capabilities to offer services further up the “value chain.” The rise in sales of Enterprise Platforms amongst Asset Managers is blurring the lines between the Front and Middle Office. Asset Servicers need to streamline commoditised services and innovate in higher value products to dovetail into these Enterprise Platforms. A strategic stance, rather than only pivoting around a client-led approach, is key to safeguarding Asset Servicers relevance as Enterprise Platforms become increasingly popular.
How are consolidations across the industry impacting Asset Servicers?
Consolidation continues within the Asset Management industry – across clients, regions, and products, against the backdrop of constant cost pressures. Strategic relationships are being prioritised over “best-of-breed.” This requires Asset Servicers to invest globally and across core product lines rather than seeking to specialise. Identification of regional and service gaps
What should Asset Servicers do to meet the growing demand for alternative asset classes?
Demand for alternative solutions continues to grow as the asset class persists to receive strong allocations. Traditional Asset Servicers need to enable clients’ in their quest for asset diversification through operational simplicity. Traditional Asset Servicers need to transfer knowledge and lessons for operational efficiency to the illiquid and alternative sphere, such as AI, automation and analytics.
Does financial technology innovation have a bigger role to play beyond process automation?
We see many use cases beyond automation that can heighten the quality of Asset Servicing clients' experience, not just generating cost reductions.
There is much greater focus on the frequency and accuracy of reporting within Asset Managers, to regulators and, importantly, to clients. Many are frustrated with low functionality portals for managed services. Asset Servicers should be launching out-of-the-box, end-client portals or reporting platforms to save Manager bespoke builds, and provide greater accuracy and timeliness of data. Asset Servicers automation of processes should contribute to, and generate, broader operational tracking data; feeding into risk and quality metrics like KPIs.
Changes in varying international markets and jurisdictions are pushing on Asset Managers for faster decision making; cash still continues to be a problematic area for firms. Asset Servicers have an opportunity with data science and analytics to prove themselves critical to their clients’ most crucial daily operations.
What did we learn from COVID-19?
The commercial benefit of outsourcing continues to be front and centre of many a business case, however, COVID highlighted to the industry the importance of scalability, resilience, and dynamism in operations to “keep the lights on”. Managers who have historically preferred an in-house model identified certain weaknesses in their own operational infrastructure. The move to remote working and the volatility of resource resiliency has reopened the question of outsourcing Investment Operations and started a conversation on functions like Trade Execution
