In line with the current trend within the data management solution vendor community towards establishing an Asian presence, Eagle Investment Systems has added its own to the mix with the opening of an office in Singapore. The US headquartered subsidiary of Bank of New York Mellon Asset Servicing has decided to establish an on the ground presence in the Asian region in order to get closer to the markets, explains John Legrand, managing director of Eagle’s Asia Pacific and EMEA operations.
The vendor already has a number of clients in the region and its new office is handily based within its parent company’s premises, after all, vendors need to grab cost savings in any which way they can in such a budget conscious market. However, Eagle reckons that the region has a lot of potential for the future due to the renewed focus on risk management and data management by Asian investment firms.
“Our clients’ businesses are becoming increasingly sophisticated and complex. This has led to rapid changes in their technology requirements. They need better visibility into their data, greater accuracy and automation of investment accounting, as well as the ability to measure in much finer detail the performance of their investments,” claims Legrand. “Establishing a permanent presence and providing on the ground support in Asia is therefore the right next step for us.”
Legrand has been charged with leading the new Asian operations and he has recruited two new team members to lead the sales and support efforts in the form of Danny Lim and William Tan. Lim, who was most recently a sales manager with Thomson Reuters covering the Southeast Asia region, will head sales efforts for the region. Tan, who was also previously with Thomson Reuters as a senior consultant, is now responsible for implementation consultancy and sales support at Eagle.
Lim has a total of 12 years’ experience in the Asian financial services industry and prior to working with Thomson Reuters, he held sales positions at Bloomberg for four and a half years covering Asian regions.
The new team will be responsible for working with prospective clients, managing existing client relationships and assisting with client implementations. According to Legrand, another two members will join the team in the fourth quarter of this year (perhaps Thomson Reuters is due to lose another two of its Asian staff members in the near future?). One will handle client consulting and implementations, while the other will manage all local client relationships.
The poaching of experienced team members from a data vendor is a canny move by Eagle to gain faster client traction due to their existing data related relationships within the region. In addition to English, the team speaks numerous Asian languages including Bahasa Melayu, Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien and Teochew.
“Growth markets across Asia, including China, are critical to the future of Eagle, and we are committing the resources, people and capital needed to pursue the significant opportunities in the region,” says John Lehner, president of Eagle Investment Systems. “Singapore with its strategic location and highly business friendly environment, is an ideal base from which to develop our Asia business. With this new Asian operating centre, we have taken a critical step to increase our presence and franchise in Asia to better service our expanding client base.”
Last year, Eagle added a couple of Asian-based firms to its client list with the signing of Nomura Asset Management in Tokyo and AMP Funds in Australia. At the start of this year, Lehner spoke to Reference Data Review about his targets for 2009 and indicated that the vendor was expecting at least 20% of its new business to come from overseas markets. The new office should mean that next year’s figures will be even more swayed towards international clients.
Lehner also elaborated about his belief that the application service provider (ASP) vendor model would prove to be popular over the course of 2009. It is likely that this model will also be a selling point for Asian firms keen to reduce their operating costs quickly and that Eagle will be keenly touting this model over the next 12 months in these markets.
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