Friends says the launch, which is pencilled in for later in 2010 although no date has yet been fixed, is designed to offer a home for the funds of employees leaving corporate schemes, but will also be targeted at the public at large.
Prior to that, in the first quarter of 2010, the provider is launching its corporate investment platform for defined benefit trustees. This will be the first of a series of launches in relation to its corporate pensions platform, announced at the time of the Resolution merger, which will also include lifetime savings vehicles for the workplace.
Trevor Matthews, chief executive of Friends Provident says: “The Sipp is designed to help people in corporate plans to take the functionality they have been enjoying with them when they leave. It will compare well on price although we don’t have details yet, and we may push it out through IFAs if that makes sense at the time. But we have not yet decided on that yet.
“The corporate investment platform will be modern and very quick. It will make it easy for trustees to move money around and reduce the risk of being out of the market.”