Hedge Fund Awards 2015

Hedge Fund Awards 2015 www.acquisition-intl.com 44 Best Bespoke Solutions in Hedge Funds Viteos Viteos is redefining the approach to fund administration, creating a new benchmark as a “next-gen” administrator through the pursuit of excellence, says David A.A. Ross, Global Head of Marketing Investment managers thrive on information. They need to know certain things at certain times, and want it delivered in a certain way. At Viteos, we create the processes, write the code, and connect all the parts to make it happen. Our clients are often managing complex funds with intricate fee structures, dynamic use of trading and leverage, and diverse underlying assets. Additional complexities can arise from having multiple funds and other legal entities, onshore and offshore interests, plus hundreds or even thousands of clients who invested at various times and under various agreements. None of these challenges are daunting to the team at Viteos. Process engi- neering begins at the onboarding stage, as we develop a detailed under- standing of an investment manager’s needs. This typically includes the chart of accounts that will flow into the trial balance, desired file formats, account- ing methodology, pricing policy, and desired frequency for reconciliation and NAV calculations—as often as daily. With our due diligence complete, we create an effective structure of files and work flow. After a prudent test period, the process goes live—and Viteos is always there to refine and adapt the process as an investment manager’s business evolves. Clients benefit from a customized solution that is designed by a team that truly understands asset management, and that takes full accountability for their results. Shadow-accounting Viteos provides a complete range of services to shadow the books and records for which there may be a different administrator contracted by the fund. In such a case, Viteos offers to perform all or some services which are part of fund administration services and also do a compare of reports with the official books and records for the fund as a control check. The conversation around outsourced shadow-accounting continues its shift with momentum first distinguished from the traditional definition of a “dou- ble-do” to a new forward looking “reporting of information”. While we stand alone at the front in outsourced shadow-accounting after five years offering this service, we also have repositioned our brand as primarily an outsourced shadow-accounting firm. This is our core offering and now view any new fund administration business as non-core and no longer actively pursue it. The 39% growth in outsourced shadow-accounting assets supports the strat- egy. Why is the interest so high? As hedge funds compete for institutional flows, they are seeing the value of moving from being producers of data and towards becoming consumers of information--a competitive edge at attracting investor capital. The future At the last survey we knew of three other firms who offer outsourced shad- ow-accounting. Since that time the list of firms has grown to nine and we expect more. HFMWeek has added a shadow-accounting category to their awards. We continue to make improvements to our offering with the addition of each new fund as its special characteristics require customize solutions each time. No two solutions are the same so there is no package pricing, the increase in our AUM is solely due to shadow-accounting assets. The reporting and timeliness of taking the data of the post-trade life-cycle eco- system through an institutionalization process are turning data into normalized storage formats that can be sliced, diced and kneaded into intelligent information. Access is critical for both business intelligence and investment intelligence. Thirty years ago the standard settlement was T+5, today T+1 is inevitable. For those savvy state-of-the-art managers with outsourced shadow-account- ing firms supporting them, cutting a NAV can be done daily and in some cases trade reconciliations can be updated three to four times during the day. At some point in the future the T+ time frames will be compressed to as close as zero as possible driven by agility, a primary need of the modern hedge fund. n Company: Viteos Fund Services Name: David A.A. Ross Email: [email protected] Web Address: www.viteos.com/shadow Address: 80 Cottontail Lane, Suite 430, Somerset, NJ 08873 Telephone: +1 732 356 1200 x1220 Fact File Best Bespoke Solutions in Hedge Funds