Research Affiliates, an investment management firm based in Newport Beach, Calif., has chosen Asset Control's AC Invest data management solution to underpin its data management operations.
Research Affiliates required a data management system that could expand along with its growing roster of products and affiliates around the world. The new system must allow them to continue to deliver what they are best known for: innovative solutions for asset allocation and the Research Affiliates Fundamental Index® methodology, an alternative to traditional capitalization-weighted market indexes that is based on the size of a company's economic footprint, not its market price.
To design and implement its strategies, the firm requires data that span the globe and every asset class. The firm also wanted the ability to identify and override incorrect historical data using exception workflows and create a clear audit trail of every change. The enhanced data control will give Research Affiliates a competitive advantage in researching, testing, building, and maintaining its investment models and will ultimately help improve client and affiliate service levels.
Katrina Sherrerd, chief operating officer of Research Affiliates, said, "We are a research-intensive firm handling large amounts of financial data from around the world. We needed a solution that helps organize and manage this vast volume of data which are critical to our investment models. A solution now exists that allows us to identify problems in the data and correct them in an intelligent and auditable way. That is what AC Invest does - it gives us significantly better visibility into, and control of, our data. When you are building portfolios of the scope and size that we do, this is a huge advantage."
Phil Lynch, president and chief executive officer at Asset Control, said, "AC Invest was designed with the business user in mind as well as affording firms fast implementation and low cost of ownership. AC Invest enables firms to quickly and cost-effectively get the correct data into their business by using a standard product framework for centralizing business knows knowledge and giving non-technical business users the tools they need to define the process, content and structure of data."