FIS Global, this year’s Best Portfolio Management Software Provider, has seen the pandemic act as a major driver in accelerating the move to digital, with clients expecting the firm to enable this.
“While it was a challenging time, we had the scale, technology and people needed to deliver that very rapidly,” says Paul Landi, Product Strategy, Digital Investment Analytics, at FIS.
In adapting to these challenges, FIS has evolved to help clients in the longer term. Their workflow tools allow people to collaborate and communicate without being in the same room and provide a greater ability to track actions and provide a better audit trail.
The biggest trend observed by FIS in recent months is the thirst for more data, with investors asking GPs for more data and GPs asking the same from FIS.
“Ten years ago, data was very disparate, with no real audit trail,” says Landi. “We’ve got past that now: everyone has become operationally ready, at least to the level that they are using software platforms or have a clear understanding of processes that are not software-based.”
The next wave of innovation is focusing on helping clients get value from their software, he adds.
Managed services trend
The need for managed services is also a major focus for clients. “One fear that people often have when implementing new software is that they will undergo a big implementation and introduce a new software package – but then find that they lack the people, time and resources they need to make the most of it,” Landi says.
As such, clients are increasingly asking for managed services to support their use of software once an implementation is complete, with FIS enabling clients to outsource less value-adding tasks like data collection.
Portable data
Another priority is the need to be able to make data portable, so that it can be extracted and used elsewhere. Landi says: “Once data is in our system, we can package it and send it to clients’ data warehouse so they can use it in other reporting systems and packages.”
FIS is also working on building functionalities to make it easier to understand risks and opportunities, including using a stoplight view to indicate quickly whether workflows are outstanding, whether KPIs are meeting budgets, and whether data is in line with forecasts.
Looking ahead
Looking to the future, Landi believes that the current focus on ESG will continue to evolve and grow. “This topic is very much still in its infancy– we’re not even at the crawling stage yet,” he says. “While there are fund managers that know they need to collect data, they are still trying to figure out what to do with it.”
Further, he believes that the focus will increasingly be on data integration and on having a plan about how to make things better. “It’s not just about reporting scores, but also about making operational changes and doing good,” Landi says.
“While people are still focused on making money, they want to do this in a way that is sustainable – and younger generations in particular are really passionate about making a positive change to the world.” 
Paul Landi, Product Strategy, Digital Investment Analytics, FIS
Paul Landi is a product manager within the strategy group of our Private Capital Markets business at FIS. In his role, Landi is responsible for transforming client requirements into innovative solutions that help them achieve smarter performance, enable growth, future – proof their operations and stay ahead of the competition.
