W&F September 2017

September 2017

Driving Success Creative ITC works with of some of the world’s largest brands defining and delivering IT infrastructure solutions.

They were honoured to achieve the prestigious ‘MD of the Year – UK’ Award, within the 2017 Business Elite Awards.

To mark this achievement, we interviewed Managing Director, Keith Ali to discover the firm’s mission and his expert insights on the wider IT industry today.

The Indulgence Show

The Prudent Group

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Editor’s Comment Welcome to this bumper edition of Wealth & Finance Magazine, providing you with the latest industry news across both traditional and alternative investment sectors.

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In recent news, WhiteHorse Capital (“WhiteHorse”) announced the expansion of its direct lending team with the addition of Daniel Dubé as a Principal.

WhiteHorse is the direct lending affiliate of H.I.G. Capital, a leading global private equity and alternative assets investment firm with $23 billion of equity capital under management.

Creative ITC works with some of the world’s largest brands defining and delivering IT infrastructure solutions. Taking time to discuss their fresh approach to delivering quality infrastructure, is Managing Director, Keith Ali. Highlighting the reason for their success as remaining grounded and honest, which has been part of the company’s DNA from day one, Keith shares with us Creative ITC’s mission and his expert insights on the wider IT industry today.

Elsewhere in this issue, we dive into the world of indulgence when we find out more about the most anticipated audio show of the year, The Indulgence Show. The show is a major new HiFi, portable audio and luxury living experience for London.

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Here at Wealth & Finance Magazine, we truly hope you enjoy reading this insightful edition and look forward to hearing from you.

Jessica Daykin, Editor

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READ THIS MONTH’S CPD ACCREDITED ISSUE TO GAIN 6 CPD POINTS

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Indulge Me The Indulgence Show 4. News 6. Driving Success Creative ITC 10. Innovation in Investment Markets Celvum Capital 12. Pyramids, Passion and Scientific Progress CymaScope 16. Generating Exceptional Returns Stats Investment Management Co., Ltd. 20. Indulge Me The Indulgence Show 24. The Alternative Hedge Fund The Prudent Group 28. The UK Finance Market Gets a French Connection 30. Fintech Revolution For UK Market 32. Path Solutions Signs Sudan Financial Services Co. To Imal 34. Finance Market Unprepared for GDPR 36. Payment Causes Problems 39. Winners’ Directory BMO Wealth Management Most Outstanding Wealth Planning Services

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News

Bruce Carnegie -Brown Named New CMI President Lloyd’s chairman takes over reins from outgoing Mike Clasper in latest appointment to help drive innovation in the industry.

Bruce Carnegie-Brown has been appointed the new president of the Chartered Management Institute. Carnegie-Brown will formally take over from outgoing president Mike Clasper at the professional body’s AGM.

Carnegie-Brown said: “I’m passionate about the talent of tomorrow and CMI has a great heritage of developing leaders and managers. Investing in young people who have the ideas and motivation to drive businesses forward is essential to helping us Currently the chairman of both Lloyd’s grow a globally competitive UK plc. I of London and Moneysupermarket. look forward to working with CMI as it com Group, Carnegie-Brown brings to builds on its successes, particularly in the role a wealth of experience from its professional apprenticeships that a 30-year career in the City. His other will transform how we train our next appointments include vice chairman generation of managers.” of Banco Santander SA. Carnegie-Brown has been a Companion of Ann Francke, CMI’s chief execuCMI since 2014. tive, said: “Bruce brings a wealth of experience across the private and CMI is the only chartered body for not-for-profit sectors both in the UK management and leadership profesand globally. I’m looking forward to sionals with more than 157,000 in working with him to continue CMI’s membership. The body now partners success as we aim to eliminate the with more than 90 universities and ‘accidental manager’ and raise leader500 education providers to help nearly ship standards.”

40,000 aspiring or established managers gain CMI-backed professional In his successful career, Carnegqualifications in the last year alone. ie-Brown roles have included managCMI also offers Chartered Manager ing partner of 3i Group plc’s Quoted status, the highest accreditation in Private Equity business, CEO of management.

Marsh McLennan’s UK and European businesses and a managing director In the past two years, CMI has of JP Morgan. He is also a Trustee worked with a group of 30 employers of Historic Royal Palaces, a Deputy to develop the new breed of manage- Lieutenant of Greater London, a Past ment apprenticeships, including the President of the Institute of Bankers Trailblazer flagship Chartered Manand a member of the Chartered Insurager Degree Apprenticeship. A new ance Institute.

Master’s level degree apprenticeship for senior leaders is due to launch in October.

Blackstone Completes Acquisition of International Market Centers, Inc. Blackstone announced on 26th September that funds managed by Blackstone Real Estate Partners and Blackstone Tactical Opportunities completed the previously announced acquisition of International Market Centers, Inc. (“IMC”).

On 26th September, one of the world’s leading investment firms, Blackstone announced that funds managed by Blackstone Real Estate Partners and Blackstone Tactical Opportunities completed the previously announced acquisition of International Market Centers, Inc. (“IMC”), the world’s largest owner and operator of premier showroom space for the furnishings, home decor and gift industries, from Bain Capital Private Equity, L.P. and funds managed by Oaktree Capital Management, L.P. Fireside Investments also partnered with Blackstone on the acquisition.

leader,” said Andrea Serra, a Managing Director in Blackstone’s Tactical Opportunities group. “Blackstone will leverage its significant resources to ensure IMC’s ongoing leadership position as the industries it serves continue to grow and evolve,” said Tyler Henritze, a Senior Managing Director in Blackstone’s Real Estate group.

Blackstone is one of the largest real estate investors in the world, with over $104 billion of assets under management across its opportunistic, core+, private REIT and debt funds and has made investments with a total enterIMC is the world’s largest owner and prise value of over $4 billion in Las operator of premier showroom space Vegas since 2013. Blackstone plans for the furnishings, home decor and to support the continued growth of the gift industries, with 12.2 million square company and has significant financial feet of world-class exhibition space capacity to invest additional capital for in High Point, NC and Las Vegas, NV future re-development, development catering to over 2,000 exhibitors. The and acquisition opportunities.

Company’s mission is to build and operate an innovative, sustainable, “We are extremely proud to leave beprofitable and scalable platform for hind a strong, stable and well-capitalthe furnishings, home decor and gift ized platform comprised of world-class industries. exhibition space assets that attracts buyers and exhibitors from around “This marks an exciting time for the world and delivers an efficient International Market Centers,” said and rewarding market experience.

Robert Maricich, Chief Executive We are confident that the business is Officer of IMC. “We look forward to well positioned for its next phase of working closely with our new partner, growth, happy that it continues in safe Blackstone, during our next phase hands and deeply appreciative of the of growth. Blackstone is a firm with a management team who led us on this strong track record of enabling trans- journey and will continue to steward formational change and shares our the business through its continuing long-term vision for the business.” success,” said Ryan Cotton and Phil Loughlin, Managing Directors at Bain “Blackstone is excited to partner with Capital and Kaj Vazales, Managing IMC’s top-tier management team to Director at Oaktree. drive continued growth of this industry

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Driving Success

Company: Creative ITC Name: Keith Ali Managing Director Email: keith@creative-itc.com Web Address: www.creative-itc.com LinkedIn: @keithali Address: 320 City Road London, EC1V 2NZ UK Telephone: + 44 (0) 2076 822 820

Creative ITC works with of some of the world’s largest brands defining and delivering IT infrastructure solutions. Their fresh approach to delivering quality infrastructure whilst remaining grounded and honest has been part of the company’s DNA from day one, and to which they owe their remarkable success.

They were honoured to achieve the prestigious ‘MD of the Year – UK’ Award, within the 2017 Business Elite Awards. To mark this achievement, we interviewed Managing Director, Keith Ali to discover the firm’s mission and his expert insights on the wider IT industry today.

Managing Director, Keith Ali shares with us the firm’s mission and how they engage their clients, as the interview begins.

“The mission of Creative ITC is built around my mission in life. We strive to be the best you can possibly be and treat everyone with respect and as such, this philosophy is applied to everybody from the cleaner to the CEO. I think it’s important to always remember whatever role you have in a firm, we are all just human beings looking to earn a living by doing something we enjoy. I like to remind my staff of that at every possible opportunity.

“We always engage a client project as if it is ours, so that involves quick mobilisation and taking last-minute changes in our stride. If something needs fixing, we’ll just take care of it, often its done proactively before their end users even notice there’s a problem. Our passion and dedication that runs throughout the business, is why our customer retention ratio is so high and keeps climbing. We’re extremely proud to be an eight-figure, referral based business that is growing by 25% year-onyear. I believe that success is built on delivering an outstanding customer experience, something that I never forget.”

How does it feel to be selected as the exclusive ‘MD of the Year – UK’ Award, within the 2017 Business Elite Awards?

“It’s an honour - when you’re so focused on growing the business and developing staff to represent the firm’s personality - it’s easy to forget sometimes the impact that you have. It’s not very often as an MD that you get a pat on the back, with somebody saying: ‘Well done, you’re making a real difference’. So, any recognition is nice, but to be selected as ‘MD of the Year – UK’ is extremely satisfying and I’m very proud to hold that award title for 2017.

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“We are in such a dynamic fast-moving industry, that staying ahead of the game is a misnomer.

What’s more important, is ensuring that what you do today doesn’t close any doors for any future technologies. At Creative ITC, of course we always have an eye on the latest technologies, but ensuring our clients infrastructure and strategic direction is flexible enough to adapt to emerging technologies as they mature or sometimes fade away, I believe is the firm’s real strength.”

Creative ITC’s financial performance over the past year has been impressive to say the least.

“When Creative ITC started 11 years ago, we traded under a single entity ‘Creative IT Consulting Ltd’ and were a consultancy practice, turning over around £200,000 a year. Today - we have multiple entities under the Creative Group - with offices in the UK, Dubai, USA, Canada, Netherlands, Australia and Hong Kong with a 2016 combined group turnover of over £24 million between them.

“We always engage a client project as if it is ours, so that involves quick mobilisation and taking last-minute changes in our stride.”

“In 2015, the firm turned over £12 million globally, so during the past 12 months we have doubled in turnover, whilst slightly increasing our blended gross margin from 14.8% in FY 2015 to 16.3% in FY 2016. Now, we are six months into FY 2017 and are on track to hit double-digit growth and slightly increase our blended GP margin as well.

To say that we are pleased with the results and forecast, is an understatement.”

Culture is something very close to Keith’s heart.

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“We are the original work hard, play harder firm and taper the long nights and the go above and beyond mentality as the norm, with some amazing internal events. I’m a massive believer that happy staff are the best performers and will feel connected to the firm, in a way that automatically drives success.

“Last year, as a celebration of the firm’s 10th anniversary, we took all UK based staff to an allexpenses paid weekend in Marbella Spain, and in June we took the entire company to a day at the races during the Goodwood Three Friday nights event. The Sigma Light Show was simply awesome.”

So what is next for Creative?

“It’s very interesting times at Creative ITC, as we have just spun up a new division in a slightly different technology sector, the digital marketing space. Simply put, online customers today use multiple channels and devices across their journey, so experimenting across these touch points is more important than ever. We have some of the industry’s leading individuals in this space working for us, that have both the reputation and experience to really impact the market.

“Creative CX has been created to ensure clients are delivering a consistent experimentation programme everywhere on any channel and device, which in turn drives optimum conversion rates or CRO, as its known as. Creative CX also know that every customer is different and that is why we have continued our unique tailored approach to engagement. We work in partnership with our customers, to develop and agree upon a bespoke plan that is suited to their unique set of circumstances. It’s all guns blazing at the minute, as the team ramp up, but the opportunity for us all is huge.”

Where do you see the future for Creative and the wider IT sector?

“The biggest financial shift at the minute, is around companies striving for annuity based review, through cloud subscription services and X as service offerings. Across the globe, this has a huge impact and we are already seeing the largest wave in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity in the IT sector since 2011. At Creative ITC, we have drivers in place to move the needle from the firm’s existing 15% split of annuity based revenue, to our two-year target of a 50% split. This will become important for us in the future and will secure the firm’s position, as a leading enterprise class managed services provider.

“I feel very privileged at Creative ITC to have worked directly with some of the world’s largest brands, as we have helped many of these define their IT infrastructure to be high performance, robust and most importantly in this era, secure. Clients such as Jupiter Asset Management, Columbia ThreadNeedle, Centrica, Tilney Group, Smith and Williamson, Skanska, Westfield, Arup and Aecom -have all welcomed our fresh approach to delivering quality IT infrastructure whilst remaining grounded and honest - something we must stay part of the firm’s DNA for many years to come.”

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Innovation in Investment Markets

Company: Celvum Capital Name: Ron Keith Email: Ron@celvumcapital.com Web Address: www.celvumcapital.com Address: 301 Battery Street, Suite 200, San Francisco, California, 94111 USA Telephone: +1 408 209 6955

Celvum Capital is a small firm, with about 50 clients. All their clients are highly accomplished, self-made, high-net-worth individuals (HNWI), who are looking to grow their accumulated wealth. Following their success as receiver of the Most Innovative Investment Strategies 2017 accolade and being included in the Hedge Top 100 Awards, we spoke to Ron Keith to learn about the firm’s work in supporting investors.

Celvum Capital’s clients are highly accomplished, self-made, high-net-worth individuals (HNWI) who are looking to grow their accumulated wealth.

While Celvum Capital is a small firm with about 50 clients, the quality of their work cannot be emphasised enough.

Ron Keith is keen to reveal the firm’s overall mission and how they remain at the cutting edge of new developments in the industry, as the interview kicks off.

“Our mission is to provide our investors with a very diversified portfolio of equities, that provide long term investment returns greater than the S&P 500, while simultaneously providing return volatility that is significantly less than the S&P 500. To achieve our mission, the firm has spent more than seven years developing an algorithmic trading system, that manages both stock picking and market exposure management.

“We are continuously and relentlessly working on improvements to our algorithms and trading system, by testing new investment hypotheses on an ongoing basis.”

“No fund or firm is always the best option. It’s really about the alignment between the firm’s approach and the investors goals. For high-networth individuals (HNWI) and family office looking for very broad equity exposure in a long/short portfolio, Celvum Capital has a pretty compelling product offering.”

Ron then offers his reflections on how it feels to be selected in the Hedge Top 100 Awards, as the Most Innovative Investment Strategies 2017 and what this means for the firm.

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“We are very pleased to be recognised by industry professionals, for our truly unique and highly innovative algorithmic approach, to both stock picking and automated exposure management.

“This award is further validation of our years of effort in developing our algorithmic trading system.

We have always known that there is no other product quiet like it in the market and as such, it’s great to have this independent validation of our innovative approach.”

In closing, Ron outlines the industry in the region currently and provides a flavour of the firm’s internal culture.

“The hedge fund industry is a pretty global business, so there really aren’t many specific regional influences.

“We are continuously and relentlessly working on improvements to our algorithms and trading system, by testing new investment hypotheses on an ongoing basis.”

“We are a very small firm with an intense focus on scientific and algorithmic innovation, to reduce return volatility for our clients. The culture is very much about understanding the behaviour of investors and markets and capturing those behaviours in algorithms, that show predictive power.”

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Pyramids, Passion and Scientific Progress

For more information visit: cymascope.com john@sonic-age.com

Sonic Age Ltd has a history stretching back to 1969, the year when man first walked on the moon. And while Neil Armstrong was taking his giant leap for mankind, John Stuart Reid, who had studied pure electronics at University, was founding his small acoustics business. Yet, as you will come to read, his company has just created a product that is poised to make its own giant leap.

The 1969 fledgling company soon grew into a family business, employing several members of John’s family, including mother, father and elder sister, as well as sales director Ray Scott. Products and services included acoustics consultancy, sound and lighting contracting, high-powered laser displays and pyrotechnics. The company saw many major contracts in its 30-year history, including the installation of the largest sound and lighting system in the UK in Glasgow’s Zanzibar nightclub, in 1985, valued at around £1M in today’s money. Their engineering staff worked on several pavilions in the 1990 Gateshead Garden Festival, and their work on the Northern Electric Pavilion was awarded first prize of the entire festival. But though the company was modestly successful, with sales of around £1M annually, John’s passion for science was not being fulfilled and an event occurred in 1997 that changed everything.

On a tour of Egypt, John and his father, George, entered the famous Great Pyramid and its enigmatic King’s Chamber. John lay in the chamber’s sarcophagus, a 3.7-ton granite box, and made vocal sounds to casually test its acoustics.

But what happened next was as surprising as it was inspirational: he felt every cell in his body tingle. John takes up the story.

“At that point in my career, having worked in the field of acoustics for almost 30 years, I was not prepared for the extraordinary effect that my own vocal sound had on my body. In that moment, I sensed that this effect might have been a designed feature of the pyramid. With that in mind, I gained

“I expected to see, at best, a range of simple geometric patterns in the sand. But as I bent low over the membrane, watching the sand grains move, they suddenly began to jump up and form into a shape that strongly resembled an ancient Egyptian hieroglyph.” permission to carry out a series of acoustics tests and a few months later I entered the pyramid with an armory of test equipment. One of the experiments was designed to test the resonances of the sarcophagus and involved stretching a PVC membrane across its open top and sprinkling on some sand. A speaker excited the membrane with

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a series of pure sounds. I expected to see, at best, a range of simple geometric patterns in the sand.

But as I bent low over the membrane, watching the sand grains move, they suddenly began to jump up and form into a shape that strongly resembled an ancient Egyptian hieroglyph. At this point the antiquities inspector became very animated and we began to work as a team, taking photographs and changing the frequency of the tone. With each new sound a different hieroglyphic-like form emerged. In effect, each “hieroglyph” in the sand represented a sound made visible, a natural resonance of the sarcophagus. I knew then, within this simple technology, lay the essence of a new type of scientific instrument.”

Following the events of 1997, John decided that his future lay in his passion for science and two years later, in 1999, he sold the Sound Electronics trading business and renamed his company Sonic Age Ltd, to begin researching methods of making sound visible. Now, after two decades of dedicated research and monetary investment, the result is a new type of scientific instrument called, “CymaScope”, with intellectual property protected by several patents in the UK and abroad. The instrument is attracting the attention of scientists worldwide, and just as the invention of the microscope and telescope opened new vistas in the fields of biology and astronomy, the CymaScope is revealing aspects of Nature that were previously invisible, in this case, the realm of sound.

One scientist in particular, Dr. Sungchul Ji, who is based in the USA, was present at a lecture that John gave in Sofia, Bulgaria, in November 2016 to 120 scientists. Dr. Ji explained, “I found his lecture to be inspirational, so much so that upon my return to the USA I began to investigate how I could digitize this important new scientific tool, which would allow me and other scientists to analyze CymaGlyphs (the name given to sound patterns) quantitatively. I contacted John Stuart Reid and made suggestions as to how this might be possible. Astonishingly, within the space of only a few weeks, facilitated by the timely financial support provided by GreenMedInfo.com, Bonita Spring, FL, USA we were able to develop a digital method that allows any CymaGlyph to be analyzed numerically.”

“We were thrilled to receive the award from Wealth & Finance News. I think it is fair to say that all individuals and organizations dedicating themselves to their passion and to excellence deserve recognition for their efforts, along with a full measure of acknowledgement of the difference that their work has made.”

The first project chosen for the Digital CymaScope is to differentiate between healthy cells and diseased cells, which could lead to the development of a new diagnostic tool—a potential giant leap for medical science.

Last year, Sonic Age Ltd also launched a CymaScope app for Apple iPhone, iPad and a large range of Android-powered devices that makes voice and music visible and is proving popular with the general public. But John also sees a future for the CymaScope as a children’s science toy for the 21st Century and the company is now planning the development of an accessibly priced child’s model.

We asked John how it felt to win the Business Elite Award of Best in Acoustics Research for their Imaging Device: CymaScope, and what difference winning the award will make to Sonic Age Ltd in terms of future business?

“We were thrilled to receive the award from Wealth & Finance News. I think it is fair to say that all individuals and organizations dedicating themselves to their passion and to excellence deserve recognition for their efforts, along with a full measure of acknowledgement of the difference that their work has made. We will continue refining the CymaScope instrument in the years to come and developing applications in fields as diverse as Astrophysics and Zoology. We have high hopes that the readers of Wealth & Finance News who have an interest in new technologies will connect with us and become involved in fulfilling the instrument’s full potential in the world of science and entertainment.”

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Generating Exceptional Returns

Company: Stats Investment Management Co., Ltd. Name: Shogo Sekimura Email: ssekimura@stats.co.jp Web Address: www.stats.co.jp Address: COI Hirakawa-Cho Bldg. 7F, 1-7-20 Hirakawa-Cho, Chiyoda-Ku, Tokyo 102-0093 Japan Telephone: +81 3 6658 4361

First established in April 2005, Stats Investment Management Co., Ltd. (“Stats”) is a hedge fund manager based in Japan. Stats specializes in managing Japanese Equity Long/Short strategies.

The flagship investment vehicle of Stats is the Ginga Service Sector (“GSS”) Fund, which is a Cayman unit trust first established in June 2006.

The strategy largely concentrates on the IT and Service sectors equities only listed in Japan, focusing on medium and small size stocks, which are not widely covered by analysts so that proprietary research can generate alpha. These sectors are also one of the few areas that have growth potential and volatilities. The characteristics of this sector require investment manager special instinct and great insight on company movements.

Stats’ CIO, Toru Hashizume is one of Stat’s founding members. Prior to joining Stats, he worked as a sell side analyst for more than eight years with one of the major research institute in Japan, and specialized in the IT and Service sectors. Later, he moved to one of the largest mutual fund companies in Japan and managed its equity fund for more than seven years. At Stats, he started to work out the disciplined long short strategy with new risk management. US educated, Yhu Kuni, has worked with Toru for more than 10 years as fund manager and IT service sector analyst, since inception of the fund. Stats’ investment philosophy is to base its investment decision on corporate research, and for this purpose the fund managers make rigorous company visits, which amounts to 400 companies per year per person, and as a team they visit more nearly 1000 companies per year.

Being based in Tokyo is a great advantage in managing Japanese equities to fulfil this purpose.

The company’s other key staff include the CEO, compliance officer, and senior trader who have also been working with the investment team for over seven years. This keeps the family-like culture of the firm which is conveyed within the founder’s mission, “Investment activities itself means seeking truth with honesty in our conduct for sole achieving best performance for clients”.

GSS Fund has performed extremely well with no negative year during its 11-year track record, and has achieved a net accumulated return of 300% for its Yen share class. This is a strong piece of evidence that the GSS strategy can effectively generate exceptional returns in various market environments and market cycles.

Heading forward to the remainder of 2017 and beyond, Stats is now considering to open new fund raising channels such as Euro-dominated UCIT fund in Luxemburg.

“Investment activities itself means seeking truth with honesty in our conduct for sole achieving best performance for clients”.

Currently, Stats manages over $251 million in assets in the same strategy. 80 % of Stats client base is out of Japan. The geographical client base is spreading out FoF, family offices, institutional clients and financial institution of Asia and Europe.

2017, like any other year, has been a challenging period for hedge fund managers: the GSS Fund returned 1.90% during Jan – Aug 2017. At Stats, we analyse the market and formulate our investment policy for the rest of the year.

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During August, there were moments where investors bought companies following good earnings announcements, however, general sentiment worsened as the situation in North Korea gradually became more severe. With the market volume falling, the selloff by foreign investors continued and investors horded to lock in profits for specific theme-driven growth stocks in the mid/small region, which have largely performed over the past few months. TOPIX at the end of the month was 1,617.41 points (-0.07% MoM), and the Nikkei225 average was 19,646.24 yen (-1.40%).

Within the mainstay issues, the selloff by foreign investors and BoJ’s ETF buying demand continued, which both dented alpha generation capability. However, due to the price adjustment within the mid/small cap market, chiefly strong theme driven names, we have begun to see the potential recovery in alpha generation on the short side. With respect to stocks with high valuation and high participation rate of individual investors, we have decided to reduce exposure towards mid/ small cap names with relatively low liquidity as the worsening sentiment may trigger further decline in stock price. Also, in preparation for the risk-off movement accompanying the severe situation in North Korea, we restrained the portfolio risk and ended the month with low net exposure.

Currently, Stats manages over $251 million in assets in the same strategy. 80 % of Stats client base is out of Japan. The geographical client base is spreading out FoF, family offices, institutional clients and financial institution of Asia and Europe.

There is no change in view, that foreign investors are not in a situation to aggressively participate in the Japanese market, where there are limited macro events. As a result, we need to pay attention to the volatility risk due to limited overall volume and supply and demand factor may largely swing stock price movement. However, we believe that such risks will remain short-term as there is a sense of cheap valuation and support by the BOJ purchasing ETFs. By continuing investment decisions from a medium term fundamentals and valuation perspective, we intend to regard shortterm volatility as good opportunities for rebalancing the portfolio.

In regards to the challenges facing us in the future, the market is expected to be volatile in a thin market. Since the GSS strategy works best in a highly liquid and fundamentally driven environment, we expect that the sector will continue to be challenging for our strategy.

However, as Stats has done so successfully in the past, we will continue our efforts to generate superior returns even in a challenging environment.

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Indulge Me

Company: The Indulgence Show Web Address: www.indulgenceshow.com Telephone: + 44(0)20 7248 5846

The Indulgence Show is a major new HiFi, portable audio and luxury living experience for the capital of the UK, London. To find out more about the most anticipated audio show of the year, we interviewed a spokesperson from the company.

The Indulgence Show has two overriding aims, firstly to attract a much larger cross section of manufacturers under one roof than is possible at a regional show and secondly to bring a new audience to our manufacturers.

Starting on a note of optimism, the spokesperson imparts their sound knowledge of the wider industry in the UK and what the shows itself sets out to do.

“We are blessed with a vibrant audio reproduction (hi-fi) industry in the UK which includes a good number of small regional shows, some organised by dealers, some by enthusiast groups. This is great news for us all as it gets the latest hi-fi equipment in front of more people. However, the visitors tend to be enthusiasts themselves and so, while it feeds their desire to see and experience new products, it doesn’t do a huge amount to attract new consumers into the industry.

“The show aims to answer the perennial question that is put forward by manufacturers and dealers alike, namely, ‘What do we have to do to get new customers?’. The Indulgence Show is designed to do just that. By combining three sections into one show: headroom™ (which focuses on the very popular consumer past-time of listening to highquality music on the move).

“Pure Pleasure which brings together non-audio indulgent goods coupled with some amazing live music performances, with Audio London (pure unadulterated hi-fi), we expect to bring a new group of people to the audio reproduction companies and introduce them to just how good their pre-recorded music can sound. For many of them it will probably be their first experience of ‘proper’ high-quality music reproduction for the home.”

As to how the concept for The Indulgence Show came about, the spokesperson is eager to explain this further to us.

“It’s been about 10 years since the last major show in London, which in our view is ridiculous for an industry like ours that sells luxury goods, given that the nation’s capital has the largest concentration of people and the highest levels of disposable income in the country. For a decade, the talk at industry events has been of the desire to see a large-scale show that is free from fiscal, political or media agendas in London again.

“So, we have listened and done the logical thing, which is to expand our concept for something called the headroom™ show that we have organised for the past three years, which focuses purely on headphones and portable audio and turned the event into a full-scale audio show.

In addition, we have broadened it out to other lifestyle, indulgent brands and products.”

“They were very impressed with the consumers who visited the show and were keen to learn more about how good their music could sound on high-quality audio equipment.”

The spokesperson then reveals the tremendous response received, after last year’s show.

“The overriding response from most exhibitors was that they completely understood what The Indulgence Show was all about. They were very impressed with the consumers who visited the show and were keen to learn more about how good their music could sound on high-quality audio equipment. From a standing start, there were 3,000 visitors and we are expecting this figure to increase substantially this year.

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“In addition - the exhibitors were impressed with the numbers of other exhibitors that attended - and the level of interest is already exceeding where we were this time last year. There’s also a greater number of different exhibitors for the Pure Pleasure area, such as home furnishings, home accessories, bags and totes, specialist travel services, recreational vehicles, cars, with more to come.”

Following on the from the success of last year’s inauguration show, people expect it to be bigger and better in the future, the spokesperson highlights.

“We have many more household names already signed up such as Sony, Arcam, KEF and PMC. As I’ve already mentioned the Pure Pleasure area has attracted many more lifestyle exhibitors this year, which will appeal to more women and families. In addition, headroom™ at Indulgence continues to grow in both scale and interest.

With regards to the three zones featured at The Indulgence Show (Pure Pleasure, Audio London and HeadroomTM), the spokesperson then details what each section offers.

“Pure Pleasure is designed for people who like music in its many forms and are prepared to spend their disposable income on it but are also likely to be into items like cars, recreational vehicles, home furnishings and accessories, travel and other indulgences as well as truly amazing live music.

So why not bring these things to the same location and let people indulge their passions across multiple areas under one roof? Conversely, those who are attracted to attend by the Pure Pleasure exhibitors, because they happen to appreciate the finer things in life, are exactly the right people to be exposing to quality home entertainment.

“Audio London differs from most audio shows in that we have a substantial number of rooms that are considerably larger than the usual hotel bedroom environment of smaller regional events, so manufacturers will be able to do much more in terms of putting on an exciting and effective show of their specialist equipment. We’ll have the

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bedrooms as well, as they suit some of the smaller specialist companies perfectly, but the overall scale of the event will be bigger. The exciting aspect for us is that consumers will be able to experience music like never before and there are going to be several UK firsts, that will excite the visitors, including an audio system costing around £500,000. “headroom™ is showcasing the remarkable potential available in the personal and portable audio reproduction arena, packed with the leading lights of the portable audio market. The manufacturers and suppliers will be bringing visitors the most comprehensive showcase of products to listen to music on the move, all under one roof.”

Ending the interview on a note of optimism, the spokesperson tells us about the confirmation of a much larger exhibition of rare photographs by Ross Halfin, following the buzz around this year’s show.

“Ross Halfin was a huge attraction last year with his exhibition of rock photographs of some of the world’s biggest musical icons. Thus, this year, Ross has agreed to bring along his very rare and treasured collection of posters and other memorabilia as well as his iconic photographs and we are expecting his gallery to be extremely popular. We also have some further musical surprises up our sleeve, suffice to say that visitors will not be disappointed!

“As the advertising and marketing efforts of the organisers and all the exhibitors starts to ramp up, we anticipate that consumers will be impressed with what The Indulgence Show has to offer them.”

Readers should go to The Indulgence Show website www.indulgenceshow.com and look out for news, features and updates across our social media channels twitter @indulgence_show; Facebook @indulgenceshow; Instagram: www.instagram.com/indulgenceshow Tickets are selling fast, so book in advance to avoid disappointment at www.indulgenceshow.com

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The Alternative Hedge Fund

Company: The Prudent Group Contact: Alfred Neimke Email: Alfred@prudentgroup.us Address: 2, Boulevard de la Foire, L-1528 Luxembourg Website: www.prudentgroup.us

The Prudent Group offers our investors the possibility of meaningful investment returns in the alternative banking market in Brazil. The company runs regulated funds in both Luxembourg and São Paulo, Brazil, to achieve this objective. Alfred Neimke tells us more about the company and discusses being named in the Hedge Top 100 and Most Outstanding Hedge Fund Manager 2017.

Prudent focuses primarily on short term corporate lending in Brazil. By providing working capital to small and medium sized companies, the firm support the reinvigoration/growth of the Brazilian economy. The company finance thousands of business transactions every month, mainly in noncyclical areas of the economy. Overall, the aim of Prudent is to create long-term mutually beneficial relationships with its Borrowers.

Working closely with client and maintaining business relationships can open the door to other opportunities. The team see a growing number of cross-border businesses between Brazil, Americas and North America as well. These sub-strategies are more suitable for it to break out in a separate investment product. Alfred explains how the firm can help its clients, and what potential there is for Prudent.

“If preferred by investors, we can also protect the investments with credit insurance (for instance in our credit card related transaction model). Within the Prudent Family, we have the objective to create a vehicle for international investors into the high yielding Brazilian Capital Markets.”

Alfred goes into detail about his role at Prudent, explaining how he oversees the whole project and company strategy, and how he looks to identify opportunities for the firm which may present themselves. He also mentions how he is constantly looking to improve the products and services, interacting with clients and partners, ensuring that they are satisfied with what Prudent is providing.

“Firstly, it is natural for me in the Prudent structure to focus, on one hand, on the overall strategic direction; identify different attractive profitable subsegments, dedicate resources to explore margins and scalability of the opportunities.

“Secondly, on the other hand, I enjoy to spend time with both our clients and our investors and explore how we can better service their needs. To adjust and improve our investment process in ways that meet their expectations is key to our future success.”

“Within the Prudent Family, we have the objective to create a vehicle for international investors into the high yielding Brazilian Capital Markets.”

Constantly looking to build on its success, Alfred discusses why it is important to demonstrate excellent money management and advisory services within the financial sector. Striving for excellence is one of the key systems which will enable Prudent to push on in its quest to become the market leader.

“Extraordinary achievements in any part of business life is rarely accomplished by following the crowd. The money management business has unfortunately lately taken a tilt towards size of assets and indexing.

“At Prudent we are convinced that in order to create value added services, we need to dedicate our efforts to the tail-ends of the normal distribution

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The Alternative Hedge Fund

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curve. Simply put, the company needs to strive for excellence in process and risk management to achieve greater results. We are confident that skill will be in fashion soon again.”

Furthermore, Alfred continues by commenting on the importance of the staff at the company, and how influential they have been in Prudent’s success. The experience of employees is something Alfred alludes to when positively mentioning the staff.

“Fundamentally, it is all about the people, the staff is key to our success. Lending is a tricky business, and we have had the good fortune to be able to utilize the Brazilian economic slump to lure over highly seasoned professionals when building the Prudent business. Most of our many Senior Associates have more than 20 years of industry experience and bring a wealth of industry knowledge, endless contact networks and a good eye for sensible business transactions for us to pursue.”

Interestingly, Alfred provides us with some examples of success that Prudent has had recently, noting the company’s venture into the extremely profitable Brazilian credit card receivables sector. Innovation is another important aspect of how the company continues to achieve, as Alfred explains what the company brings to the investment community.

“One of the achievements in the year just passed is that we within Prudent have managed to enter into the extremely profitable Brazilian credit card receivables arena. We did in less than six months create our own echo-system of card terminals, processing and receivables discounting in which we are creating a possibility for the Merchants to get rid of their banks. As said above, we are offering the international investment community proper risk adjusted returns in this yield-starved world.”

In his concluding comments, Alfred indicates where he believes Prudent fits into the wider hedge fund industry. Not like most other hedge funds in the traditional sense, the company solely invests in self-generated short term corporate receivables.

He signs off by predicting what challenges Prudent and the industry itself will face in the future.

“Prudent is not really a hedge fund in the traditional sense as we solely invest in self-generated short term corporate receivables. Prudent is an operational business active in the Brazilian credit market seeking scalable and repeatable transactions. Furthermore, our fees are much lower and our liquidity better than any hedge fund I have seen. Hence, we are a business classified as a hedge fund.

“Regulatory straight-jacket is increasingly stifling and costly. Moreover, the flight to the largest money managers is creating a highly strange competitive landscape in the business. As said above, we do hope that investment excellence soon will be back in vogue again and determining allocations and not the sheer size of the AuM.”

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The Alternative Hedge Fund

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The UK Finance Market Gets a French Connection French firm Banque Transatlantique is set to launch wealth management offering in UK. Banque Transatlantique, part of leading French banking group Crédit Mutuel-CM11, has appointed Robert Jeffree as Chief Investment Officer, based in its London branch. Robert will be responsible for developing a new discretionary and advisory wealth management offering that will complete the bank’s private banking service available in the United Kingdom. This new development from Banque Transatlantique comes a year after the successful launch of its UK banking services, which have seen a growing demand from the bank’s core French non-domiciled clients, as well as from an increasing number of British nationals with interests, such as property and business, in France.

Banque Transatlantique is an international French private bank which has a long tradition in Private Wealth Management, having catered for wealthy French nationals living overseas since 1881. The bank has earned the trust and confidence of its clients through the specificity of its services and expertise, which involves looking after families, entrepreneurs, French citizens living abroad and foreigners living in France and major foundations.

Banque Transatlantique is present in 12 cities worldwide, from the West Coast of the United States to Asia.

Robert has over 20 years’ experience in investment management, having held influential roles in retail and institutional fund management, strategy consulting and wealth management.

Robert’s previous role was as Chief Investment Officer of C. Hoare & Co. He started his career at HSBC Asset Management, before moving to McKinsey’s European Asset Management practice and then to New Star where he was manager of the Asia portfolio.

Launching in January 2018, the wealth management service will offer clients access to a range of portfolios constructed using regulated third-party funds. Investors will gain access to a broad and diversified range of risk premia derived from global equities, government bonds, credit and alternative asset classes and strategies.

Rotation of investment style and factor exposures will be used to add value on a tactical basis. Fund selection will be a truly independent process, managed in London, with the focus being on liquidity, transparency and cost efficiency.

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Gwenolé Le Blevennec, General Manager of Banque Transatlantique London Branch, comments on the latest news.

“We are delighted to have Robert join the team in London. His considerable experience will enable us to grow a wealth management offering to serve the investment needs of our clients.

“Banque Transatlantique continues to invest in the development of its UK operations, as we remain optimistic about the City’s post-Brexit prospects, and as a French bank are committed to growing our presence in the UK. The long-term success of the firm depends on its ability to serve global customers by growing the international reach of our services.”

Additionally, Robert Jeffree, Chief Investment Officer of Banque Transatlantique London Branch, stated: “I am pleased to join Banque Transatlantique at such an exciting phase in their development. The opportunity to build a new investment offering, for a client base with which we have built strong relationships over many years, is uniquely appealing. With the backing of a strong and stable parent we have been able to plan

“I am pleased to join Banque Transatlantique at such an exciting phase in their development.” for the long term and put together an attractive proposition.

“Between now and launch in January, I’m taking time to meet with our banking clients to properly understand their investment needs. We have no legacy issues to deal with; we can design our investment offering in the best way to meet the client’s objectives and the new regulatory framework. People often ask me about our client’s attitude to Brexit; the outcome is clearly uncertain but what I hear is that our clients enjoy living in London and the UK and are too busy focusing on their careers, businesses and family matters to be overly concerned.”

This latest news proves that despite Brexit and the various issues that the UK faces, within the financial industry the country remains a hub for international businesses.

The UK Finance Market Gets a French Connection

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Fintech Revolution For UK Market In the UK 65% of businesses embrace fintech. As a recent study shows, UK businesses now adopting fintech are saving £4.6b every year.

Business finance company MarketInvoice surveyed UK businesses on their awareness and adoption of fintech (financial technology) products and services. MarketInvoice is a business finance company with offices in London and Manchester.

As the world’s leader in online invoice finance, the firm are changing the way businesses fund their growth. MarketInvoice uses smart technology and proactive customer service to help businesses take charge of their cash flow, quickly and easily. Since 2011, they have funded over 70,000 invoices worth £1.5 billion (as of 31st August 2017).

invoice finance. Only 2% of businesses are using insurtech (insurance technology) services.

Businesses can choose between having an open funding line against their outstanding invoices (MarketInvoice Pro) or financing invoices as and when they need to (Select). MarketInvoice delivers fast, flexible funding to help businesses do everything from pay suppliers and staff to launch new products and grow.

Business leaders are drawn to fintech because it saves time and money (56%) whilst a third (34%) were impressed by the user experience.

Interestingly, a quarter (23%) said fintech’s were more transparent on fees and provided a better customer service.

In 2013, the UK government via the British Business Bank, began lending to businesses through MarketInvoice. This partnership has now seen more than £100m provided to small businesses in the UK. MarketInvoice is a member of the Peer-to-Peer Finance Association and is backed by private equity group MCI Capital (also invested in iZettle, Azimo, Gett, and Auctionata) and leading European venture capital fund Northzone (invested in Spotify, Trustpilot, and SpaceApe).

The results show that 77% of UK businesses are aware of fintech products and services and two-thirds (65%) have adopted at least one fintech application, with a fifth (19%) taking on four. These adopters reported saving (on average) over £5,500 a year as result of using the fintech products and services.

Interestingly, a tenth (11%) reported using bitcoins or other cryptocurrencies at some point in the past year in processing payments. Whilst the clear majority (89%) have not used cryptocurrencies, a fifth (21%) of these businesses expect these currencies to feature in their payment transactions over the next 12 months.

Businesses reported using fintech products and services for banking transactions (23%) and foreign exchange services (16%). Meanwhile, one in four (24%) reported using cloud-based software for their accountancy functions and a third (32%) used online lenders for business loans or

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Bobby Lane, partner at accountancy firm SSH LLP, commented: “Most of our clients are now using cloud-based solutions and automating many of their routine processes. This means that I have more time to focus on advising my clients on strategic matters. Also, it’s now far easier for us to use fintech services because the ability to integrate with these new systems has opened up huge opportunities for improving processes”.

Jerry Anderson, Managing Director at wedding rings company Allied Gold Ltd, commented: “We’re a thirdgeneration family business, I have adopted fintech across the business from our accounting to our banking services. The user experience and service is far superior to what is available on the high street”.

“The expansion of tech-driven digital services has been remarkable over the past 5 years.”

Anil Stocker, CEO and co-founder of MarketInvoice commented: “The expansion of tech-driven digital services has been remarkable over the past 5 years. We know that consumers have been adopting tech applications into all parts of their lives, but our research shows that now UK businesses are also becoming tech-savvy.”

“Fintech applications are revolutionising the way business is being done from how employees report their expenses to the way businesses report their financial performance. Entrepreneurs always seek out the best means to drive their businesses and clearly fintech products and services are becoming a stable part of this approach.”

It’s not only business processes that are benefitting from fintech adoption. Companies are using fintech to engage staff. 62% of businesses use fintech adoptions for staff to report expenses (i.e. Expensify) and for payslips automation. A further 23% are using online pre-paid cards (i.e.

Revolut) in allocating budgets to teams.

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Path Solutions Signs Sudan Financial Services Co. To Imal The Islamic modern core banking platform affords higher levels of automation and flexibility.

Kuwait-based Path Solutions, an international core banking system provider for Islamic banks and financial institutions, has announced the signing of a licence agreement with Sudan Financial Services Company (“SFSC”), giving Path Solutions unrestricted access to deploy its iMAL Enterprise Islamic & Investment System across their business.

SFSC was established by the Central Bank of Sudan (CBOS), with a percentage ownership of 99% and the Ministry of Finance and National Economy (MOFNE) holding 1% stake. The company provides financial services in accordance with Sharia principles related to the management and dealing of share allocations owned by the Sudanese government, its corporations and institutions through Sukuk issuance.

“Revamping our technology platform with Path Solutions’ iMAL is an important step towards accelerating operational efficiency and achieving growth targets”, commented Khamis AboAmer, General Manager of SFSC. “A modern Islamic financial services system paves the way for our company to accelerate business performance, helping to boost the delivery of Sharia-compliant financial services. We can now become more customer-centric and meet the changing demands of our expanding customer base”, he said.

Under the terms of the agreement, iMAL solution will enable SFSC to offer targeted and customized offerings to its customers. The solution will also help them eliminate various manual processes, enhance productivity, reduce errors and ensure 24x7 availability. With iMAL, SFSC will not only achieve a significant jump in operational efficiencies, but will also accelerate growth, manage scale and drive innovation, thereby providing superior value to its customers.

Mohammed Kateeb, Group Chairman & CEO, Path Solutions, commented on this latest exciting development.

“Over the past couple of years, we have made significant investments in our core banking system.

The deployment of iMAL will give SFSC the flexibility to develop more efficient processes, and

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better manage real-time data with respect to its NPA (non-performing assets). It will also enable them to launch new products and services in a Sharia-compliant manner, thus increasing their competitiveness in Sudan. We will continue to focus strongly on the Sudanese market, where we have already made our mark, and focus on providing world-class technology-driven business solutions and services to our esteemed clients”.

Path Solutions is the world’s largest provider of Islamic software solutions with over 120 clients across 37 countries. iMAL offers a complete front-to-back office platform that powers banking operations for Islamic financial institutions from start-ups to established Islamic banks entering new markets. iMAL has been consistently ranked as the first best-selling Islamic core banking system worldwide for the past eight years by International Banking Systems, UK. Overall, this latest news highlights the fact that Path Solutions is at the forefront of the Islamic financial software industry, providing a broad, deep spectrum of Sharia-compliant integrated solutions and services that cover Core Banking, Customer Service Management, Investment Banking, Risk Management, Treasury and Trading in GCC and Global Capital Markets.

Designed to meet the needs of modern Islamic banking, Path Solutions’ turnkey solutions are based on an open, flexible architecture and an established deployment methodology. They have been tested and implemented at some of the world’s most sophisticated Islamic banks, Islamic banking windows as well as conventional banks converting into Islamic banking operations.

With a diverse client base and a global presence, Path Solutions’ team of qualified professionals and complimentary solution partners have an unparalleled ability to address regulatory and Sharia compliance requirements at both international and regional levels. Armed with deep industry expertise and field-tested best practices, the team strives to provide the highest quality services to clients all over the world.

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Finance Market Unprepared for GDPR Finance industry addresses lack in GDPR preparedness with hires and investment to support compliance as the rules come into force.

The finance industry is not very well prepared for tackling the complex challenges presented by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

This is the finding of a survey of 253 CIOs and IT decision makers in the UK, conducted by data management company, NetApp. Only 13% of IT Managers in the finance industry fully understand the GDPR. Just 33% claim to have a good understanding and 38% to have at least some understanding of the regulatory framework. At the same time, 17% admit they do not know what GDPR is – substantially more than in the retail (6%) and healthcare industry (8%).

Furthermore, only one fifth (21%) of finance industry IT Managers know where all of their data is – considerably less than their colleagues in the retail (24%) and healthcare (62%) sectors. Half of IT managers in the finance industry only know where some of their data is stored, and even more worryingly, nearly one third (29%) are not confident at all in knowing where their data is stored – which is key for GDPR compliance.

The consequences of a lack in understanding of GDPR: • Only 38% of IT Managers do not have any concerns about meeting the GDPR deadline and delivering what is needed to protect their business’ reputation and assets.

• Meanwhile 59% have sleepless nights and 4% are extremely concerned.

Addressing the deficit in GDPR preparedness: • Almost a third (29%) of financial IT Managers say they invest more in data regulation compliance, and just over a fifth (21%) have hired specific personnel with data protection expertise.

• Half of IT Managers in the finance industry have started to make some GDPR preparations and 33% claim they are already fully compliant.

• Only 13% - less than in the retail (24%) and healthcare (23%) industry - have not yet made any GDPR preparations.

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The GDPR requires business to be compliant when processing EU citizens’ data within a robust data privacy compliance framework. The deadline for businesses to achieve full compliance is 25 May 2018.

Grant Caley, UK & Ireland Chief Technologist at NetApp at NetApp, said: “Whilst the finance industry lags behind in terms of GDPR preparedness, the investment into data regulation compliance and experienced staff will increase levels of both awareness and preparedness for GDPR. It remains to be seen if these investments are sufficient to get businesses compliant before the May 2018 deadline.

“Whilst the finance industry lags behind in terms of GDPR preparedness, the investment into data regulation compliance and experienced staff will increase levels of both awareness and preparedness for GDPR. It remains to be seen if these investments are sufficient to get businesses compliant before the May 2018 deadline.

However, the survey also highlights the importance of ongoing education and how important it is for financial businesses to treat GDPR as a broad issue, involving legal and compliance teams as well as IT experts. Finance companies cannot achieve GDPR compliance using IT solutions alone – but these will form a fundamental part of the process once a comprehensive legal framework is in place.”

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Payment Causes Problems Study reveals US businesses are wasting time and money handling the payment process, with evidence showing that supply chain friction costs businesses 6,500 hours a year.

The average US business loses $171,340 per year through clunky payment practices causing friction in their supply chain, according to new research by Tungsten Network. This equates to almost 6,500 man hours chasing purchase order numbers, processing paper invoices and responding to supplier enquiries.

As Tungsten Network launches its inaugural Friction Index report, businesses estimate they spend on average per week around 55 hours doing manual, paper-based processes and checks; 39 hours chasing invoice exceptions, discrepancies and errors and 23 hours responding to supplier enquiries. They also spend five hours on compliance-related challenges such as handling international taxes and three hours tackling invoice fraud.

Rick Hurwitz, Tungsten Network CEO, commented on the findings and how they affect the industry.

“Numerous processes in the financial world remain cumbersome and time consuming when they needn’t be. Technology means we can do away with the tiresome and menial tasks that clog business work streams and instead boost productivity and efficiency. It is surprising that in this tech enabled day and age businesses are still spending so many hours per week managing a process that could be automated.”

The sources of friction identified by the report amount to 125 hours per business per week or 6,500 hours per year. When multiplied by the average hourly US pay ($26.36) this means US businesses are losing as much as $171,340 a year resolving payment issues.

When surveyed, the Top Five Friction factors were named as: 1. High proportion of paper invoices received 2. Too many non-PO based invoices 3. High volume of supplier enquiries regarding invoice or payment status 4. Lack of automated exceptions 5. Lack of automated approval

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Understandably given the wasted money and man power, 36% of businesses state that removing friction from the payment process is a top priority for 2017. However, a full 20% state it is not a priority at all – perhaps an indication that the scale and cost of the problem is largely unseen.

Rick continued: “If businesses aren’t tied up chasing invoices or receiving phone calls from suppliers doing the same, they have more time to explore opportunities for growth with existing customers and go after new ones. If all the data from past invoices is easily accessible, opportunities to identify variances that will target inefficiencies are more visible. The technology exists to remove this supply chain friction, which

“It is surprising that in this tech enabled day and age businesses are still spending so many hours per week managing a process that could be automated.” can cause stress, waste time and ultimately impact the wider economy, and we want to challenge US businesses to embrace digitization and begin enjoying the benefits of a frictionless back office.”

Tungsten has developed The Friction Index to explore which companies are most affected by friction in the supply chain. By analyzing the current state of potential causes of friction and the priority level of removing friction from procure-topay processes, it has created a friction score which it will be able to review year-on-year. In 2017, large companies had a friction score of 101.0 whereas medium (99.7) and smaller (96.3) companies recorded lower Friction Index scores. This shows that larger companies are most affected by friction and are more likely to lose valuable resources chasing after payments and responding to queries.

Finance teams at large companies with more than 1,000 employees, and smaller firms with less than 100 employees from 422 businesses all over the world took part in the study. They were asked about what supply chain friction looks like for them and the impact it has on their business.

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