The Gemini Companies (Gemini) has released insights from a recent webinar featuring industry experts who discussed the complexities and unique legal and regulatory concerns of private equity funds.
The webinar was moderated by James Williams, Managing Editor, Private Equity Wire. Panelists included: Dominique Severino, Partner, Orthogon Partners; Dennis Schall, Partner, Alternative Investments, Marcum LLP; and David Young, President, Gemini’s solutions for hedge/alternative funds.
Important webinar topics included:
- Current trends, best practices, and specific guidelines for existing and new PE managers.
- What managers need to consider before outsourcing accounting and administration tasks.
- Challenges administrators face delivering a bespoke service based on a manager’s individual valuation policy, waterfall calculations, and distribution calls.
- How Limited Partnerships are driving innovation.
- How investors are redefining reporting and transparency for alternative assets.
- Standard vs non-standard reporting: to what extent standard reporting can be achieved.
- How technology is driving change in data management.
Gemini polled investors and senior fund managers during the webinar, and revealed that 96per cent saw a clear value to outsourcing PE fund servicing, with access to expertise (53per cent), cost efficiency (28per cent), and security (19per cent) designated as the specific advantages of this model.
“The data is not surprising, as PE funds have grown tremendously in recent years. Through outsourcing, managers can more efficiently and effectively scale operations while delivering the unique calculations/reporting, communications, and capital calls/distribution these funds require,” noted Schall.
Severino succinctly summed up the advantages and value of outsourcing by adding: “As an emerging fund manager, we have a limited number of hires, so we don’t just look for service providers, we seek team members. We consider these experts to be an extension of our company. Having an extra set of eyes on our business is crucial for us to focus on our investment strategy while delivering bespoke insights to our clients.”
