How much of your administration and distribution functions can you hand over to service providers? Funds Europe talks to Bob Kneip, the chief executive officer of Kneip.
Regulation has been a major burden for the asset management industry. On the flipside, this has generated business opportunities for some service providers. This includes Bob Kneip’s business, Kneip, a specialist in fund communications.
“Asset managers cannot afford to be non-compliant,” he says. But being on the edge of compliance is also not an option. What fund managers need to do is keep things simple, he says.
“I believe in simple ideas and simple concepts – simple concepts that are easy to understand and easy to communicate.”
Kneip is a collector of art, some of which is featured here. His business, though, is all about industrialising certain tasks that financial institutions, banks and asset managers must fulfil.
It offers fund managers, administrators and promoters services including cross-border multi channel electronic and print fund publication, and fund reporting and fact sheet production.
“Our ambition is to offer clients an extension of their own operations.”
With a wave of new regulation, however, Kneip’s challenge will be to constantly adapt and extend its services. With more than 40% of Ucits sales coming from outside Europe, Ucits is now considered a global brand.
Preferences for fund administration services are therefore also likely to shift, challenging service providers further.
Regulation has been the main driver of Kneip. The Ucits directive and subsequent revisions of it, have kept Kneip’s team busy. This includes the fund passport and everything related to the key investor information document.
Other pieces of regulation causing additional impact are the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive and the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive.
“When times are difficult, clients need us more than ever,” says Kneip, adding that most of his clients face regulatory constraints. “They have to focus on managing assets and distributing funds.”
©2012 funds europe
