This Week’s Vendor News

NEW & UPDATED PRODUCTS

The Citco Group has upgraded its Citco Waterfall tool to enable real assets fund clients to automate complex carried interest waterfalls for funds and joint ventures. The new functionality covers unrealized/hypothetical distributions, realized cash distributions and scenario/projection calculations, and provides for the allocation of deal specific carried interest calculations. The new enhancements not only provide benefits to clients using Citco’s fund administration services, but are also available to non-administration clients via Citco’s Waterfall Ancillary Services offering. ↗

Ark has launched its new comprehensive fund accounting solution, arkGL. arkGL is engineered to address the demands of partnership accounting, providing a seamless, integrated approach to managing private fund operations and investor relations. arkGL is fully integrated into Ark's existing platform, enriching functionalities related to investor allocations and portfolio management. ↗

Chronograph has launched Chrono AI to assist with analyzing portfolio monitoring data in the cloud. Chrono AI helps LPs synthesize and summarize large data sets on demand, quickly distilling relevant information for efficient intelligence gathering and decision making. Private equity investors can now gain insights on fund and company performance, market and industry updates, transaction activities, outlooks for investments, news on management teams, and ESG reporting from any document on Chronograph’s LP platform. ↗

SimilarWeb has launched SAM, its AI-powered sales assistant. SAM is a sales AI module that can help users close more deals, more often with prospect-tailored insights. SAM can type over 3,000 words per minute. ↗

Edda has launched the redesigned Dealflow Review on its platform. Edda's Dealflow Review’s allows for customizable templates, precise selections, and collaborative voting. ↗

Tactyc has unveiled several small improvements to its platform. New features include: Upgraded Portfolio Summary Reports - now users can save custom views in the report. Capital Summary - view by investable, deployed, and remaining in seconds. New API Endpoints - fund configuration & metadata and KPI metrics. New Field - Shares Outstanding. Hide Model View - more control in permissions to hide the Model View. Generate KPI Requests for Active Companies only. Increased Limits for Multi-Fund Views - add up to 20 vehicles. ↗

Atfinity has released Version 12 of its platform, along with many new features. Some of these new features include: End User Wizards, New case manager languages: French, Serbian and Spanish, new field type: instance relationship and time zone support. ↗

iConnections has introduced its latest feature: Communities. This new feature allows users to utilize the iConnections app and platform at non-iConnections events to network and schedule meetings with other members. ↗

Drooms has a new update on its platform that adds more transparency to user groups. When ‘Group Visibility’ is enabled, users can see all group members within the data room and who from the group uploaded which document, ensuring that team members are always coordinated, and preventing overlapping work. Users can now also share their notes, highlights, and findings with other users within their group, simplifying the workflow and boosting efficiency. ‘Group Visibility’ is a customizable feature, allowing administrators to enable it for specific user groups. ↗

Sweep has launched new features on its AI-powered platform that will make CSRD reporting easier and more efficient. New features include: materiality mapping to identify and prioritize sustainability issues based on environmental and economic impact, expanded indicator library for flexibility, the ability to automate data collection, connect to other IT systems and use benchmark references, saving time and ensuring accuracy and advanced workflows and data quality checks to facilitate cross-departmental collaboration. ↗

Attio has made a few updates to the Help Center on its platform. First, Attio has rebuilt search from the ground up to provide better indexing and results. Attio has also redesigned the contents sidebar, which makes navigation more intuitive. Lastly, Attio published a brand new ‘Attio 101’ guide, which covers fundamental concepts to help users dive into Attio and understand the basics. ↗

DEAL ACTIVITY

Apex Group has acquired IP Management Company, a South African unit trust management company. IPMC is a collaboration between financial services businesses, which have operated unit trust funds independently for more than fifteen years. These businesses compete and promote their products independently, but co-exist in a synergistic relationship within IPMC, creating a business with depth of resources and diversification of assets under administration. As part of Apex Group, IPMC’s clients will now benefit from access to Apex's global single-source solution, providing all services required across the full value chain of their business via one efficient relationship. ↗

Bain Capital has agreed to sell Zellis Group to Apax Partners. Zellis, headquartered in Bristol, UK, is currently valued at around $1.55 billion dollars. Bain Capital acquired Zellis in 2017 and Zellis has seen accelerated growth since then. ↗

StepStone Group has announced its recent partnership with MLC Asset Management - Private Equity, following the $762M closing of MLC Private Equity Partners. The managed secondary transaction was anchored by funds managed by StepStone, which served as the lead investor. ↗

MSCI has completed its acquisition of Foxberry, a London-based provider of front-office index technology for investors. This acquisition was originally announced on February 7, 2024. ↗

Hudson Structured Capital Management has announced the successful closing of its continuation fund, HS Mohawk Fund I LP, with more than $175 million of capital commitments led by StepStone Group and existing HSCM investors. Goodwin Proctor served as legal counsel to StepStone on the transaction. ↗

PARTNERSHIPS & INTEGRATIONS

iCapital and Bain Capital Credit have partnered to expand wealth managers’ access to alternative investments. Under this partnership, iCapital and Bain Capital Credit will provide financial advisors and high-net-worth investors with access to a suite of Bain Capital Credit’s private credit strategies via iCapital’s technology platform. Advisors will gain increased operational efficiency by accessing select Bain Capital Credit products via the customized Bain Capital-branded platform powered by iCapital and on iCapital Marketplace. As part of the agreement, iCapital provides a full suite of research, due diligence, and educational materials to advisors and investors to support the growing interest in alternative investing. ↗

4Degrees has announced its new partnership with Dealwise. This collaboration combines 4Degrees' relationship intelligence CRM with Dealwise's platform to reshape the future of tech acquisitions. 4Degrees will help teams looking to maximize their relationship network's potential, making it easier to close deals faster and efficiently. ↗

NextWave Consulting and PortF have won an award for funding from Innovate UK, which will enable NextWave to partner with PortF to deliver new innovations for financial institutions. NextWave will support PortF to deliver client success with its portfolio management platform, which covers the following: streamlining private capital management, uniting commercial, ESG and impact modules for holistic analytics and reporting, creating impact-focused solutions for investors and portfolio companies and enabling investors to automatically track the sustainability metrics that matter to facilitate compliance and business success. ↗

Atfinity and SmartSearch have entered into a strategic partnership together. Clients will be able to combine Atfinity's no-code process platform for automating processes like onboarding, KYC/KYB/AML and client reviews with SmartSearch's digital compliance and AML platform that performs a wide range of UK and international anti-money laundering checks. Together, both companies aim to improve end-to-end onboarding, enable organizations to reinforce their KYC/KYB/AML checks and provide a better experience to their end customers. ↗

Canoe Intelligence and Mammoth Technology have announced an integration partnership aimed at empowering mutual clients to efficiently manage and optimize their end-to-end alternative investment portfolios. Mammoth Technology is Canoe’s first partnership with a fund marketing and access platform, facilitating seamless integration of data across clients’ pre- and post-investment workflows across Mammoth and Canoe. Serving as both an “upstream” and “downstream” integration partner, Mammoth acts as a conduit for documents and ownership data entering Canoe’s platform when investments are made through Mammoth’s technology, while also receiving ongoing documents and extracted data from Canoe. ↗

SimCorp has a new business partnership with Quoniam Asset Management to transform their investment management operations. As part of the new partnership, SimCorp will provide an operational solution for Quoniam that combines the asset manager’s proprietary research and portfolio construction capabilities with the functionality of SimCorp’s enterprise SaaS platform. SimCorp will also deliver a suite of technology-enabled business services for data management and investment operations and will be responsible for data management services for investment operations including market and reference data, post-trade operations and related operational and regulatory reporting. By outsourcing operational activities to SimCorp, Quoniam can concentrate entirely on its core investment activities. ↗

Alkymi and SimCorp have expanded their strategic partnership, which began in 2020. With this expanded partnership, Alkymi can now offer automated processing for Schedules of Investments so firms can upload their SOIs in the SimCorp platform for instant processing through Alkymi, with the exact data points they need delivered back to them. Now firms can automate all of their investment document workflows through Alkymi’s platform, from SOIs and Capital Account Statements to financial statements and tax documents. The approved data can then be sent directly to the SimCorp platform and into existing workflows, reporting and analytics. ↗

Dealsuite has partnered with Cyndx to enhance M&A deal sourcing in Europe. This partnership showcases the shared commitment of both companies to leveraging AI, data, and technology to streamline and optimize the entire M&A deal sourcing and placement process. Cyndx has been building its European data coverage for the past several years and has been on a mission to organize all global corporate information, which now helps Dealsuite's users discover and connect growth opportunities. ↗

FundCount has adopted Power BI, part of the Office 365 suite, as its standard client-facing online reporting platform. Power BI seamlessly integrates with FundCount's software, enabling clients to present and gain visual insights into their portfolios with ease. Power BI is now available for download by FundCount clients. ↗

Beauhurst has introduced its plug-and-play integration with HubSpot. Now Beauhurst users can seamlessly integrate platform data into HubSpot with one click. ↗

Glenmede has joined SUBSCRIBE to enable digital onboarding and subscription document workflows for their clients who invest in private market funds. The implementation will help the firm consolidate alternative investment products, processes, and data onto a single alts operating system. ↗

Ark has been selected by Blue Star Innovation Partners to enhance fund operations and investor reporting. Blue Star's partnership with Ark ensures streamlined workflows and improved efficiency across their business operations, providing Blue Star with a comprehensive performance reporting platform for their LPs. ↗

Accordion has selected Intapp DealCloud as its relationship management platform. With DealCloud, Accordion will have a single destination for its users to find and reference communications, workflows, and other data relating to client pursuits and engagements. This will helps teams strengthen relationships, accurately track and forecast pipeline, and accelerate execution. Additionally, centralizing engagement data and Accordion’s daily activities will also provide new, actionable insights into client trends and industry developments. ↗

Leon Capital Group, a holding company overseeing $10 billion of private capital, has joined the SUBSCRIBE platform. By partnering with SUBSCRIBE, Leon Capital has a goal of streamlining the operational processes for alternative investment transactions including onboarding, electronic subscription documents, and order workflows for their investors. ↗

Atominvest has announced its newest client is Cherry Ventures. Cherry Ventures is a European venture capital firm, with a focus on early-stage investments. Atomivest is supporting Cherry Ventures with their upcoming fundraise with its purpose-built Investor CRM and Dataroom. ↗

SBI Securities has selected Broadridge’s post-trade solution for its equities brokerage services in the UK, through its subsidiary SBI Shinsei International Limited. SBI Shinsei International Limited will also be leveraging Broadridge’s Swift Service Bureau to automate Swift messaging workflows with its custodian. ↗

OFFICE & PERSONNEL

Kroll has appointed Karen Laureano-Rikardsen as Chief Marketing and Communications Officer. In new her role, Laureano-Rikardsen will oversee Kroll’s global marketing strategies, internal and external communications, as well as financial communications, corporate reputation, crisis and issues management and corporate affairs activities. Laureano-Rikardsen brings more than two decades of experience in strategic communications and marketing, most recently serving as Chief Communications and Marketing Officer for Cantor Fitzgerald since 2015. ↗

Sally Alexander is a new Client Director at Finquest. Alexander will be responsible for the end-to-end success of every deal sourcing engagement, including defining investment scope, ongoing collaborating with PE and Corporate firms to refine target data set, and delivering actionable introductions enriched with deep market insights gathered by the whole team. Alexander joins Finquest from GLG where she was a Senior Team Lead, Healthcare Enterprise Private Equity. ↗

SimCorp has appointed Allen Zimmerman as Managing Director, Head of Americas. Zimmerman will lead SimCorp in the region, including its analytics business Axioma, with responsibility for defining its strategic direction and realizing SimCorp’s growth aspirations in the Americas. He joins SimCorp from BlackRock where he served as a Managing Director, focused on business development for its investment management technology offering since 2015. Zimmerman has 18 years of experience in the financial services industry, including leadership roles within the portfolio analytics and quantitative models businesses within Barclays and Citi. ↗

Bain & Company has named Alexander Schmitz to lead its Private Equity practice in EMEA, succeeding Christophe De Vusser, the firm’s Worldwide Managing Partner Elect. Schmitz, A 21-year veteran of the firm based in Dusseldorf, is a senior member of the firm’s partner team in its global PE practice. Schmitz brings experience of advising financial investors globally on deal generation and execution, portfolio company value creation and transformations, and fund strategy. He is an active member of Bain’s EMEA leadership team and previously served as the managing partner of the firm’s Dusseldorf office. ↗

Dana Fine is the new Developer Marketing Manager at Mend.io. Until recently, Fine was a Community Leader at Cloud Native Computing Foundation. ↗

Accelex, which provides a technological solution to data extraction and analysis for institutional investors into private market, is very excited to announce the addition of five new salespeople. Three salespeople have been added in European sales, Ben Cluny, who will head up the European investor sales team, Cedric Bidjocka who is cover investors in France and Southern Europe – both hires facilitated by The Investment Recruitment Hub – and Milly Ostiana who will cover private market fund investors in Germany. Ben and Milly are joining from MSCI Private Capital Solutions and Cedric comes from FIS. In North America, Spencer Wallace has joined the team to cover Canadian investors and US pension plans. He joins from Alkymi. And Jack Kiess joins to cover US Endownments and Foundations from Bipsync. Having doubled revenues last year, Accelex is looking to double again this year and is growing the team to achieve that ambition. ↗

Novata has welcomed two new additions to its leadership team. Joel Raha is the new Chief Technology Officer and Jeanne Lee is now Head of APAC sales. With two decades of startup experience, Raha was most recently at Alloy where he was VP of Engineering. Before joining Novata, Lee was the Commercial Director at monday.com and also has almost two decades of experience in sales and market expansion. ↗

Ontra has welcomed John Lofy as SVP of Customer Success. In this role, Lofy will lead the management and strategic direction of Ontra’s customer success function, driving product adoption and will focus on expanding the reach of Ontra’s Legal Operating System. Lofy joins Ontra from Litera, where he served as Vice President of Customer Success. He brings over 25 years of experience in cross-functional leadership, including key roles at Thompson Reuters, HighQ, and Lexmark, where he successfully led Customer Success, Sales, Services, and Operations functions. ↗

IQ-EQ has announced two new key hires at the company. Toby Ritch is the new Global Head of Client Delivery and Paul Giblin is the new Managing Director for Ireland. Ritch spent over 15 years at BlackRock and brings experience from senior financial services roles across public and private markets in London, Hong Kong, India, and Singapore. Giblin joined IQ-EQ in 2022 as Managing Director of IQ EQ Fund Management (Ireland) Limited through an acquisition, in which he was responsible for driving the growth of the Group’s acquired funds business in Ireland. leader within the region. Giblin has over 25 years’ experience in the financial services sector, specialising in capital markets, wealth management and fund services. ↗

SimilarWeb has announced one new hire and one new promotion at the company. Marev Dediashvili has been promoted to Customer Success Manager and has been with the company since 2022. Patryk Kwasniak is the new Client Success Manager and he has joined from Bloomberg. ↗

AlphaSense has announced a new company hire and promotion. Aislinn Poe is now a Senior Manager, Digital Marketing (Paid Media) and has been with the company since 2022. She was previously a Digital Marketing Manager (Paid Media). Additionally, Maeve Heckard is a new Sales Development Representative at AlphaSense. ↗

Atfinity has added to its configuration team with the appointment of Jovana Stošić. Stošić, who spent six years at the OIP Team, has taken on the position of Solution Configurator. ↗

Peter Keevil is a new Sr Sales Manager at Daloopa. Before joining Daloopa, Keevil was a Senior Enterprise Account Executive at KX. ↗

Edward Beck is a new Senior Product Manager at Canoe Intelligence. Beck has previously worked at Spreedly where he was a Senior Product Manager and has also worked at Kasa Living and Waypoint. ↗

Penny Yin has been promoted to an Associate Director at FactSet. Yin has been with FactSet for 10 years and is now an Associate Director - Fixed Income Analytics Engineering. ↗

Tom C has recently stepped into a new role as Funds Editor for Mergermarket in North America. As As Funds Editor, Tom is launching Mergermarket's coverage of private funds in North America. Until recently, Tom was the Funds Editor at ION. ↗

IQ-EQ has announced new promotions at the company. Rehma Imrith is a new Managing Director for Mauritius and Pazani Vaitilingon is the new Chief Commercial Officer for Africa, India and Middle East. Sridhar Nagarajan will transition to a new role as Managing Director, Singapore and Regional CEO, Asia, Middle East and Africa. Vaitilingon has been with the company since 2020 and Imrith has been with them since 2017. ↗

John Fleming is a new Governance, Risk, & Compliance Analyst at Dynamo Software. Before joining Dynamo, Fleming was a Security Analyst at Validity and before that was at FIS. ↗

Holland Mountain has welcomed Neil Stephenson as a Senior Analyst. Stephenson is responsible for helping clients achieve success in the private capital market. Stephenson was previously a consultant at Grayce and a Financial Services Associate at Harley-Davidson Financial Services. ↗

Robert Reina is the new Executive Director, Wealth Indexed Investment Coverage at MSCI. Prior to joining MSCI, Reina was the Head of Investable Product Sales, Americas at STOXX and also spent time at BNY Mellon and JP Morgan. ↗

VENDOR RESEARCH & WHITEPAPERS

AlphaSense has a new blog, "Competitive Portfolio Positioning in Asset Management: The Power of Generative AI". This blog explores the ways that AI and genAI tools are empowering asset managers to position their portfolios with confidence and efficiency, regardless of the state of the market. ↗

EWM Global has a new blog, "Adopting Technology within your Compensation Ecosystem". This blog explores how the shift from excel driven administration to the integration of an incentive compensation platform can address the key challenges of modern compensation and benefits management. ↗

ValueWorks has a new article, "Mastering the ARR calculation: a strategic guide". In this piece ValueWorks takes you through landscape of ARR calculations, dissects various methodologies, provides explanations and engages in a discourse on the merits and drawbacks of each strategy. ↗

Crunchbase has a new blog, "AI in Sales: What to Know in 2024". In this blog, Crunchbase explores the growing applications of AI for sales – including its benefits, use cases and popular tools. ↗

Envestnet Yodlee has a new blog, "How Lenders are Using Alternative Data Throughout the Credit Lifecycle". Envestnet Yodlee feels that through the entire credit lifecycle, from underwriting and account management to collections, alternative data is redefining norms and setting new benchmarks for inclusivity, risk management, and customer satisfaction. This blog explores how lenders are leveraging this information and what the future holds for its application. ↗

Decimal Point Analytics has a new blog, "AI and Machine Learning in Asset Management: Unlocking Hidden Value". In this blog, Decimal Point discovers the transformative potential of AI and ML in asset management. It also explores how these technologies are being used to: enhance investment research, generate alpha, automate repetitive tasks and risk management. ↗

Amplify has a new blog, "The Transformative Power of Strategic Portfolio Management Software". This blog explores how the right technology is redefining the pathway to success in the modern organizational landscape. ↗

Ontra has a new whitepaper, "Insourcing High-Volume Contracts Costs 10x More Than Asset Managers Think". In this white paper you will learn about: common errors in calculating insourcing budgets, high costs associated with employee turnover and mistakes in time allocation. ↗

AWARDS

FactSet has won the Asian Private Banker's 2023 Technology Award for Best Market Data Solution. Launched in 2015, the Asian Private Banker's Technology Awards celebrate the innovations and achievements of Asia's growing fintech sector. ↗