Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management has announced its decision to offload its regional Tilney offices in Liverpool, Birmingham, Edinburgh and Glasgow to join forces with Bestinvest and grow its national presence.The financial terms remain undisclosed.
The combined group will now be able to offer funds and services ranging from execution-only brokerage, through advisory and full discretionary investment management responsible for a total of £9bn.
Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management will continue to look after its London-based clients, with Bestinvest already having strong presence in the capital.
Subject to regulatory approval, the full merger should be completed by the second quarter of 2014.
Permira is a European private equity firm with global reach. The Permira funds, raised from pension funds and other institutions, make long-term investments in companies with the ambition of transforming their performance and driving sustainable growth.
Jason Hollands, managing director at Bestinvest said the deals would allow for continued progress across the services, whichever business model was suitable for the client.
“We already have a major presence in the wealth management space but recognise that it is somewhat fragmented. Having decided to buy Bestinvest, Permira recognised that it needed a vehicle to lead its wealth management presence, and arrived at the acquisition of Tilney,” he added.
Head of wealth management in the UK for DeAWM Tom Slocock said: “Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management will continue to focus on providing wealth management services from our London office. We are expanding the range of high quality solutions we offer wealth management clients and their families.”
Bestinvest said Tilney was a long-established private client investment manager with strong relationships providing investment management services to UK financial advisers, and as such the brand would be retained.
It has £3.5bn of assets managed or advised, largely by 58 relationship managers running discretionary portfolios.
Philip Muelder, partner at Permira, added: “The UK wealth management industry has strong growth characteristics but is currently very fragmented. In combining Tilney and Bestinvest, we will bring together two highly regarded firms to create a truly market leading, UK-wide standalone wealth manager that will offer a broad and complementary range of services. The combined business will benefit from the advantages of increased scale and full national coverage and will be ideally positioned to capitalise on the opportunities that are emerging from recent regulatory changes."
