Press Room
Union Planters Enters New Realm of Wealth Management Services
--SunGard provides total solution, not just technology--
Wichita, KS, March 14, 2003—SunGard Wealth Management Services, LLC, an operating group of SunGard (NYSE: SDS), today announced that Union Planters Corporation (NYSE: UPC) has implemented SunGard Wealth Management Services’ comprehensive solution for wealth management, which includes integrated offerings from Smartleaf, Inc., and London Pacific Advisors.
SunGard Wealth Management Services has integrated offerings from SunGard, Smartleaf and London Pacific Advisors (LPA) to enable financial institutions to provide their clients with highly individualized wealth management services in a scalable and cost effective manner. Taking advantage of this offering, Union Planters Corporation (UPC), a bank holding company with $33 billion in assets, is outsourcing all of its wealth management operations to SunGard Wealth Management Services.
Al Kennebeck, senior executive vice president and financial services group managing director of UPC, explained, “We saw the fundamental business model shifting from selling products to providing consultative advice and highly personalized portfolio management services in a holistic manner across multiple life cycle events. SunGard is helping us deploy this new wealth management model. Working together with SunGard, we intend to provide exceptional wealth management services to our broad base of existing and potential mass affluent clients. SunGard brings us much more than technology; they are a tactical and strategic partner, helping UPC achieve its vision of putting trusted advisors into the market.”
The SunGard open architecture wealth management model, used by UPC is comprehensive in scope, covering front-, middle-, and back-office components.
The front-office portion of SunGard’s model is the Trusted Advisor Program which includes a financial planning system that can be scaled to meet sophisticated planning requirements or simplified to suit more basic planning needs, and an advisor resource center providing access to in-depth information on over 1,700 financial topics. Additionally, SunGard’s Trusted Advisor Program provides training to equip UPC’s advisors with the technical and sales competencies needed to build a customer-focused service and sales culture.
Middle-office products include Smartleaf’s automated asset management system, which enables financial institutions to manage individual accounts in a low-cost, personalized, and tax sensitive manner by automating the task of individualizing portfolio management, and LPA’s Web-based asset consulting services, which include asset acquisition tools and a rigorous due diligence review process for mutual funds and separate account managers.
Integration of these systems is essential to give advisors the time needed to focus on their clients. The foundation, or back-office technology, for this solution is SunGard’s AddVantage, an asset management and accounting system with an open, relational database architecture that allows for consolidated accounting/reporting of all of a client’s financial and non-financial assets on a real-time basis.
“The trend in the financial services industry is toward greater personalization and tax-sensitivity. Truly personalized private wealth management is currently the exclusive preserve of ultra-high-net-worth investors,” said Gerard Michael, president of Smartleaf. “SunGard’s integrated solution changes this, enabling financial institutions to sell premium services to the emerging affluent. Providing enhanced services for the emerging affluent without increasing costs will be the primary engine of growth for many financial institutions.”
“The partnership between UPC, SunGard, and LPA is exciting for several reasons,” said Jack Waymire, president of London Pacific Advisors. “First, it will provide UPC’s clients with sophisticated, cost effective solutions for their assets. Second, it will substantially increase the productivity of UPC’s advisors because all of the resources they need to serve their clients will be online and available 24/7. And third, comprehensive, fully integrated solutions are the wave of the future, so UPC will have a major advantage in the competitive financial services marketplace.”
Phil Owings, president of SunGard Wealth Management Services, added, “We have integrated a complete wealth management solution, not just technology, but also the methodology needed to apply that technology for the benefit of the client. Our strength is in our ability to provide integrated products and services to help financial institutions capitalize on the opportunity presented in the emerging mass affluent market. This integrated solution addresses the industry-wide movement toward mass customization. Institutions previously had to choose between scalability and personalization. Now they can have both.”
About Smartleaf
Smartleaf’s asset selection and rebalancing system enables financial institutions to provide personalized, tax-efficient portfolio management in a cost-efficient and consistent way. With Smartleaf, financial institutions can manage individual accounts in a manner that is as personalized and tax-sensitive as if each investor had a dedicated manager and as controlled, efficient and scalable as managing a single omnibus account. Learn more at www.smartleaf.com
About London Pacific Advisors
London Pacific Advisors (LPA) operates as a registered investment advisor and has been providing fee-based financial services since 1983. Several prominent financial institutions including banks, broker/dealers, and accounting firms have selected LPA to be their outsource provider for delivering a comprehensive menu of web-enabled asset consulting services. LPA’s services include money manager due diligence, web-based technology to create client-specific investment recommendations, marketing tools, invoicing, and performance reporting services. To learn more, visit LPA’s website at www.lpadvisors.com.
About SunGard Wealth Management Services
SunGard Wealth Management Services provides turnkey, outsourced wealth management services to banks, registered investment advisors and other financial services organizations. SunGard delivers a single, integrated solution for outsourcing securities operations, investment accounting, trust operations, employee benefit recordkeeping, investment programs and financial planning, as well as training programs. The SunGard solution enables financial services organizations to focus on building trusted relationships with their customers.
About SunGard
SunGard is a global leader in integrated IT solutions for financial services. SunGard is also the pioneer and leading provider of information availability services. SunGard serves more than 20,000 clients in over 50 countries, including 47 of the world’s 50 largest financial services companies. SunGard (NYSE: SDS) is a member of the S&P 500 and has annual revenues of more than $2 billion. Visit SunGard at www.sungard.com.
For more information, contact:
Nicole Burn, VP, Marketing
SunGard Asset Management Systems
Ph: 205-437-7472
Fax: 205-437-7575
E-mail:nicole.burn@sungard.com
Trademark Information: SunGard, the SunGard logo and AddVantage are trademarks or registered trademarks of SunGard Data Systems Inc. or its subsidiaries in the U.S. and other countries. All other trade names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.