2023 – the year LIBOR finally ceased, a suspected spy balloon flew over North America, Britain crowned a new King, and we learned what virtual portfolio managers are – what a year!
Reviewing the top-five most read Geneva blogs from 2023, it’s clear our community is eager to learn more about managing syndicated and private loan investments, exploring the neoteric world of AI and digital workers, and what modernizing Geneva means to our team. These blogs delve into trending topics that have defined the year; scroll through these posts for a trip down memory lane.
- Managed Services: A Differentiating Approach
By Ernesto De Sieno
The challenges faced by the investment industry in 2022 led many managers to pivot their approach to attract and retain investors. True differentiation will come down to excelling in those areas that matter most: investment performance and client service. Firms can look to managed services to provide that edge.
As Ernesto De Sieno explains in his post, managed service is a broad concept encompassing various services, from hosting technology to a full lift out of a firm’s operations. In the past, many fund managers needed to be more receptive to outsourcing parts of their business. However, as the value of cloud deployment is increasingly recognized, firms are progressively more open to outsourcing their operational tasks. According to Ernesto, the shift in favor of managed services, offers productivity gains for firms and empowers them to launch new products and enter new market segments more efficiently. - Investing in Loans? The Future Is Automation.
By Nick Nolan
At a time when equity markets are volatile, and interest rates are climbing, investors are turning to syndicated bank loans for predictable and potentially higher yields. Yet, for all its sophistication, the loan marketplace is still largely mired in paper-based, manual processes. As Nick Nolan notes in his post, the result is a market that could be more efficient with average settlement delays of 20 days to as much as three months in some cases.
Firms should be able to manage the entire loan lifecycle on a single platform - from transaction processing and settlement to accruals and income payments, as well as cash flow projections, valuations, amortization, and reporting. Read Nick’s post to understand how an automated, comprehensive accounting solution that supports a full range of alternative asset classes coupled with digital loan data is the key to mitigating the operational barriers to growth. - SS&C Advent’s Professional Services: How Our Implementation Team Helps Clients Get it Right from the Start
By Cathy Messina
How can a firm accelerate its ROI of Geneva and start seeing the benefits from day one? According to Cathy Messina, it all starts with a smooth and efficient implementation process. The best way to achieve this is to plan your implementation with the SS&C Advent Professional Services team.
Professional Services is our consulting arm, responsible for ensuring our clients realize the full value of our solutions. From the initial implementation and solution training to “lift-ins” from on premise installations to the cloud, our project managers and consultants follow proven methodologies, backed by decades of experience, to deliver successful projects on schedule and within budget. For more on how to get it right from the start, read Cathy’s post and explore our SS&C Advent Professional Services Guide. - Virtual Portfolio Managers? How Artificial Intelligence is Reshaping Investment Management and Operations
By Patton Webber
Ever since ChatGPT burst into the public consciousness in November 2022, AI, is suddenly a dominant theme in the news. The popular language model, with over 100 million users, is providing users with a glimmer of what AI is capable of, and, more importantly, it is accelerating the debate over the technology’s potential benefits and threats to humankind.
Reflecting on the transformative impact of AI, Patton Webber explores how SS&C Advent is leveraging innovative technologies like optical character recognition (OCR) and natural language processing (NLP) to enhance our services and solutions, demonstrating AI's growing role in reshaping investment management from front to back. - Future Proofing Geneva with the October Release
By Jonathan Eldridge
People and ample available skills in the marketplace help support the operations of many asset managers, which continue to be one of the biggest challenges for our customers to deal with.
In a fascinating twist, the most read blog in 2023 is a post from mid-November, focused on the Geneva October release. Jonathan Eldridge celebrates the Geneva team’s year-round commitment to moving the platform forward, ensuring it keeps pace with changing business requirements, market pressures, and new product offerings. Simultaneously, the team continues to leverage new technologies and look for ways to streamline workflows, eliminate manual steps, and deliver an efficient and differentiated experience.
Jonathan even shares insights from a Tech It Up podcast episode, where colleagues Brant Snyder and Niamh Kerrigan discuss what they are most excited about in the October release, emphasizing the importance of client feedback in shaping Geneva's roadmap.
What to expect in 2024?
The Geneva team’s primary goal is to solve our clients complex accounting and operational workflows, and believe me, they are committed to that cause. The team is looking forward to another exciting year of collaborating with our clients to build solutions and products together that solve our client’s problems today and prepare them for tomorrow. Stay tuned for more insights in the coming year.
