JP Morgan has taken a stake in workplace pensions provider Smart Pension, bringing its total funds raised to date to £50m. The deal sees JP Morgan global head of retirement solutions Anne Lester take a non-executive seat on the Smart board.
The asset manager has takena minority equity stake in the provider, which is one of the fastest growing master trusts in the UK, which was founded in 2014.
Legal & General Asset Management took a stake in Smart in 2016.
In October last year, Smart announced it had won an international competitive tender to deliver a pensions technology platform for Irish life insurer and pension provider New Ireland Assurance.
Smart says it is now in early-stage conversations with new strategic partners globally.
Smart Pension co-founder and CEO Andrew Evans says: “We are delighted to have secured this investment from JP Morgan, as it signifies a positive step in our growth and international reach. From the outset our objective has been to put user engagement and experience at the heart of everything we do, utilising technology to build an unrivalled platform. Our journey has just started, the opportunities to disrupt and do things differently in this sector are staggering, and we will be leading the way.”
Lester says: “We are investing in pensions and savings solutions and technology capabilities to help investors achieve better financial outcomes, reinforcing our commitment to putting clients first in every aspect of our business. Smart Pension has demonstrated how financial technology can have a positive impact by making it easier both for people to save for retirement and for companies to offer pension plans to their employees.”
Smart Pension co-founder and MD Will Wynne says: “In October we won our first international competitive tender to build a savings technology platform in Ireland. This gives us an opportunity to demonstrate how our unique proprietary dynamic technology is plugging a huge gap in the workplace savings platform market, and performing on a global scale. We are now in early stage conversations with new strategic partners as the world’s financial institutions grapple with regulatory change and legacy technology.”
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