State Street takes stake in PensionBee

State Street Global Advisors (SSGA) has taken a strategic equity stake in D2C pension platform PensionBee.

SSGA, which is the world’s third largest investment manager with $2.67 trillion in assets under management, has taken a minority equity stake in the PensionBee, to drive growth in the UK direct-to-customer market.

PensionBee assists customers in tracing and combining their old pensions and consolidating them into one new online plan. SSGA already runs the funds offered through its ‘Tracker’ option, one of the three portfolio approaches offered by PensionBee.

PensionBee was launched in mid-2016 and has around £100m in fee-earning assets and almost 8,000 active accounts. It has a further £125m of assets-in-transfer.

As a result of the financing, PensionBee will be expanding its white-label product line to offer pension consolidation services to banks and life companies. PensionBee already has partnerships with fellow fintech company Revolut and national newspaper The Telegraph. SSGA will take an observer Seat on the PensionBee board.

SSGA says the investment supports its objective of being ‘at the cutting edge of financial technology to enhance its clients’ experience’.

PensionBee CEO Romi Savova says: “We are delighted to welcome SSGA as investors in our company. We share the same goals of making pension saving easier and better for everyone and look forward to embarking on a new journey to bring customer-centric pension consolidation to mutual corporate clients.

SSGA global head of defined contribution proposition Nigel Aston says: “We have really enjoyed working closely with PensionBee over the last few years. We have been incredibly impressed and excited by how they use smart technology, innovative communication techniques and new media to attract and engage their audience. We share the common goal of wishing to help ordinary people make sense of the complexity of their retirement. We are really looking forward to working even more closely together as we enter the next stage of our partnership.”