Standard Life Investments expands with 10 new offices

Standard Life Investments is the asset management arm of Standard Life pensions and savings firm

Standard Life Investments is extending its global reach with ten new offices in major financial centres.

The Edinburgh-based asset manager is also expanding into a landmark site in the Scottish capital.

It is to occupy much of the building being constructed on the south side of St Andrew Square, opposite Jenners department store and where Scottish Provident was previously based.

The asset management arm of Standard Life has about £240bn under management.

It took over Ignis Asset Management earlier this year for £390m, with a warning that it would have to shed some of the 250 jobs the Phoenix Group company had in Glasgow.

Ignis had £61bn of client's funds under management.

Additional space

The Edinburgh asset manager has also expanded from managing Standard Life's customers' funds to the management of other clients' funds.

It is increasing its workforce at its main hubs in Edinburgh, Hong Kong, London and Boston.

It is also to open offices aimed at supporting clients in New York, Los Angeles, Toronto, Tokyo, Zurich, Milan, Madrid, Munich, Brussels and Stockholm.

It already has offices in Beijing, Seoul, Paris and Dublin, and works closely with other savings firms in India and Japan.

The asset manager is moving into bigger office space in its hubs in Boston and London, where it will take another floor of the Gherkin building. Three other locations are taking on more space, including a doubling of staff in Sydney.

The move into additional space in Edinburgh will see Standard Life Investments taking on five storeys of a new building under construction on St Andrew Square in the city centre, near Princes Street.

It will have space for 1,000 people, close to the asset manager's headquarters at 1 George Street.

The subsidiary of Standard Life is itself a co-investor in the £75m development, scheduled for occupation in 2017, and it claims the office letting deal is the biggest in the Scottish capital for a decade.

Chief executive Keith Skeoch said: "Standard Life Investments has seen considerable global expansion in 2014, both in assets under management and people.

"This organic growth along with the recent integration of Ignis Asset Management and Standard Life Wealth, plus the global collaboration agreement with Manulife, means we needed to prepare for the future and ensure we have the right strategy for our long-term estate portfolio worldwide"

The St Andrew Square site was occupied until 2004 by Scottish Provident, but jobs were then moved to Glasgow, as a result of its takeover by Abbey, which later became part of Santander.

Half of the retail space in the new development, in which Standard Life Investments is partnered by Peveril Securities, is already pre-let.