At a Glance

•  Replaced three separate legacy systems with Multifonds

•  Successful and fast implementation in 10 months

•  Enabled workflow efficiencies, automation, and ultimately scalability

•  Access to superior capabilities, such as SWIFT and NSCC integration, trailer fees and private equity

Nordea Asset Management is an arm of Nordea Bank, the largest bank in the Nordics. It is one of the top 20 asset management firms in the world, serving around 800 institutional clients across 54 countries. It has 251 billion euros in assets under management. It operates a growing international, third-party distribution franchise, currently totaling 300 fund distributors, including many of the leading global wealth managers. It manages funds across all the leading asset classes but is increasingly focusing on ESG and sustainable funds, which account for two-thirds of its asset portfolio. 

Adapt to thrive

This success has been built on always assessing and adapting to market changes, explains Andreas Moller, the company’s Development Strategy Director for Fund Administration and Asset Management. In recent years, that has become more challenging. “The upward trend of interest rates is shifting clients from assets to savings products, which they can manage themselves. And we are also seeing competition from governments putting out high-yielding bonds. Add to this rising operational cost pressures, and a more demanding regulatory climate, and you have a very challenging market.”

Against these headwinds, product innovation becomes even more important, says Andreas. “We need to make sure that, when the appetite comes from the client, we have the right products for them, ready to go. That necessitates both a mid-term and long-term view of where the market is heading.”

Technology is the key to that.

It’s extremely important that we have the right technologies running throughout our value chain, not only for product innovation but also to deliver operational efficiencies.”

Andreas Moller, Business Development and Strategy Director at Nordea Asset Management

The prize of unification

That stack now includes Temenos Multifonds, which Nordea Asset Management deployed in May 2022. It replaces multiple legacy systems that the business had been mandated by the bank to use for transfer agency (TA); one for the main shareholder register, another for managing trailer fees, and a third to manage Swift transactions. “Collectively they weren’t providing everything we needed,” says Andreas. “Having three different systems for TA created quite a shattered IT landscape. It was not manageable, we couldn’t automate processes, and it was driving up costs. We needed a dedicated fund system that could support global distribution.”

Multifonds brings the benefits of a single, global platform to the business, with no compromise on quality. Core requirements, such as trailer fees and private equity, can now be accessed as integrated modules, enabling workflow efficiencies, automation, and ultimately scalability.

By automating some processes, we can now put more focus on things that we didn’t have resources for before, such as reporting, mitigating operational risks, and product development. We’ve unlocked so many new possibilities, which gives us greater scalability.”

Andreas Moller, Business Development and Strategy Director at Nordea Asset Management

But platform efficiency was not the only criteria, explains Andrea. “We strongly felt that with Multifonds we could build a partnership and co-develop together, alongside its large network of other customers. This sense of being part of a global community was really attractive.”

Opening new doors

This was evidenced with the development of the integration broker feature, which has made SWIFT-related workflows faster and more efficient. The rewards of this collaboration are due to be repeated, as Nordea Asset Management looks to align with the National Securities Clearing Corporation (NSCC) as it expands into the Americas market. “Our sales teams there are very excited about it. It will really open the doors to growth.” 

Though Multifonds has been initially deployed on-premises, its common architecture offers the potential to easily switch to cloud. This was key, says Andreas. also key. “We have a clear cloud strategy, but we weren’t quite ready for that option. So knowing that we have the flexibility to move to SaaS at any time, and avoid a complex migration, creates predictability. We’re looking to do that in phases 2 or 3.”

Tried and trusted

When the day comes, the company can draw on the experience of the on-premises implementation for confidence. “There was quite a bit of complexity, especially with extracting and cleaning all the data. But we had a lot of support from Multifonds in defining the specs, and also hours and hours of workshops and training from them to ensure everything and everyone was prepared. So what could have been a long, complex implementation was completed in just 10 months”

Nordea Asset Management is now seeing the benefit of this preparation. “With any new technology implementation, you really need to invest in your people; the teams that are going to work with the product day-to-day. Multifonds has been key, not only in the technical aspects but also with stakeholder management. It meant that, when we went live, the software ran smoothly and users easily transitioned to it. There was zero disruption.”

Andreas says that, in the space of just a few years,

Multifonds has become one of our most valuable strategic partners. It means we can plan for the future with confidence, whether that’s expansion in the Americas, growing our private asset business, or realizing the benefits of cloud and APIs.”

Andreas Moller, Business Development and Strategy Director at Nordea Asset Management

Region
  • Europe
Solutions
  • Multifonds
Sector
  • Fund Administration