September 27 2020
Auckland-based investment back-office specialist MMC has refreshed its brand in a makeover that consigns the Aegis platform name to history.
To be known as MMC Wealth Administration from this week, the Aegis investment platform acquired from ASB last year now sits beside the company’s traditional fund administration business and, more recent, custody service.
In a client presentation last week unveiling the new MMC look and corporate vision, Vedran Babic, said the rebrand reflected the firm’s goal of building a “unified culture” that puts ‘client centricity’ at the core.
“The acquisition of Aegis has been a catalyst for a lot of [the MMC brand remodel],” Babic said.
MMC emerged as the surprise buyer of Aegis last October, bringing across about $15 billion of funds under administration and a large contingent of ASB staff. Since purchasing the platform, MMC has integrated both the Aegis technology with its own (now in the cloud) and shifted all employees into the company’s Queen St premises.
Today, the business has more than 140 employees servicing over 100 clients (covering funds, KiwiSaver schemes wealth managers and financial advisory firms) and $85 billion plus of assets under administration.
In a release, Babic said the MMC rebrand was a “wonderful process to collectively define our values, who we are, what we do and what we believe in; it brought us together during lockdown and gave us a singular focus”.
“What we’ve developed really is the sum of us, and communicates our absolute commitment to our clients’ success, service excellence and innovation. Our clients’ success is our success,” he said in the statement.
Founded in 2002 by Tom Reiher and Robert Moss, MMC has grown rapidly – accelerating in particular post the launch of the portfolio investment entity (PIE) and KiwiSaver regimes in 2007 – to become one of the dominant players in the NZ fund administration space.
Reiher said in the MMC presentation that the business was built on “proprietary software” rather than off-the-shelf technology, enabling the firm to adapt easily to local conditions.
At the time MMC launched, he said many thought it would be “impossible” for a NZ firm to compete against global players in the fund admin market.
“Nothing’s impossible, the impossible just takes a little more effort,” Reiher said.
The new MMC branding rolls out from today with a new website detailing the firm’s “expanded service offering and client-centric vision”, according to the release.
As well as hiring former Fisher Funds chief operating officer, Babic, as CEO last December, MMC recently appointed a new chief financial officer, Jacky Hollingsworth, two independent directors – Paul Merci and Carmen Vicelich.
At the launch event last week, Vicelich – founder of two technology firms – said data analytics would be essential for the success of any business in the current era of rapid change.
MMC is half-owned by NZ private equity investor, Pencarrow.