Equity Manager Transforms Risk Management and Institutional Client Reporting Process with Sesame

Introduction

Skerryvore Asset Management needed a sophisticated risk management and data analysis platform to meet the exacting due diligence requirements of institutional investors and so help grow its business. The cost of setting up a risk function in-house was cost prohibitive for the firm, which opted instead to partner with Landytech for its risk analysis and reporting. Thanks to the partnership, Skerryvore has since secured a number of major institutional mandates.

The Skerryvore Story

Edinburgh-based Skerryvore was established in October 2019 in partnership with multi-boutique investment firm BennBridge. Skerryvore specialises in emerging market equities, as an appointed representative of BennBridge, which acts as the regulated investment manager.

Skerryvore focuses on generating absolute long-term returns by investing in quality companies capable of withstanding the tests of time. As a fundamental, bottom-up investor seeking to identify reasonably valued, high-quality companies that are exposed to or operate in emerging markets, having a sophisticated risk management and data analysis framework is essential.

Before launching Skerryvore, the founders worked at Janus Henderson, a large UK asset manager with $400+ billion in assets. There they serviced institutional clients and could leverage institutional standard systems and reporting capabilities.

"The firm didn’t want to set up and maintain a large risk infrastructure in-house, with all the costs and internal expertise it entails."

The Business Challenge

When establishing Skerryvore, the team wanted the same institutional-level infrastructure support they had enjoyed at Janus Henderson. Because Skerryvore’s capital-raising activities are targeted at institutions and consultants, the firm needed to demonstrate it has robust, high-quality capabilities to meet prospective clients’ demanding due diligence requirements and low tolerance for errors.

But Skerryvore didn’t want to set up and maintain a large risk infrastructure in-house, with all the costs and internal expertise it entails: hiring a chief risk officer, quants and IT specialists; buying, implementing and running a risk system and database; and buying data – expenses that can easily run from $750k to $2.5 million per year.

Skerryvore instead looked for a reliable but flexible partner that could deliver fast, error-free reporting, and help the asset manager achieve its goals.

Why Skerryvore Chose Landytech

Landytech proved the perfect fit.

“Landytech provides outsourced risk reporting and data analysis for both Skerryvore and BennBridge,” explains Ian Tabberer, Portfolio Manager with Skerryvore. “Through this relationship, we have been able to meet the demanding client reporting requirements of Skerryvore’s global institutional investor base.”

Automation and validation are key. Landytech’s investment and risk reporting solution Sesame© centralises investment data of any type and from any source to furnish decision-makers with a single source of truth. Through a strategic partnership with MSCI RiskMetrics, Sesame delivers advanced risk and performance analytics – including customisable scenario analysis, historical and (non)correlated stress testing, VAR sensitivity and performance contribution/attribution – to provide non-tier 1 asset managers with tier 1-quality risk, compliance and client reporting at a fraction of the traditional cost.

Sesame’s intelligent tools allow easy navigation into the complexities of the investment portfolios, producing sophisticated analysis, on-demand visualisations and custom reports, along with critical alerts on any internally determined limits to help users make better and more informed investment decisions. The cutting-edge Sesame risk platform combines with Landytech’s managed service offering to bring the added value of experienced, professional risk oversight.

Today, Landytech produces 30+ reports on a period basis for Skerryvore’s clients. The highly automated process ensures reports are accurate, turned around quickly and delivered in the exact format investors want.

"Through this relationship, we have been able to meet the demanding client reporting requirements of Skerryvore’s global institutional investor base."

Reaping the benefits

Thanks to the partnership with Landytech, Skerryvore received the highest risk rating from a key institutional investor consultancy firm, which in turn has helped the asset manager secure a number of very large institutional mandates.

“Landytech has proven to be open-minded, resourceful and trustworthy in everything it does, and has given Skerryvore the strong technical support we need,” says Tabberer. “From the outset, Landytech has provided suggestions for how we can best achieve our client reporting goals in a timely and accurate manner, offering innovative solutions to the challenges we face in bringing data together from disparate sources. And by acting as a data integrator, Landytech reduces the burden on other parts of our small business.”