Outsourced CIO Makes Raft Of Promotions

Editorial Staff

10 January 2023

Partners Capital, the outsourced investment office looking after $45 billion of clients’ money, has made six promotions including two new partners and four new managing directors.

Emma Bewley, based in London, and Sud Murugesu , based in San Francisco, are promoted to partners. Bewley, who serves as head of private debt and uncorrelated strategies, joined the firm in 2019 in the London office. Previously, she worked at Connection Capital as head of fund investments and Pamplona Capital as portfolio manager, after starting her career at Morgan Stanley.

Partners Capital’s global leadership team now stands at 20 global partners and 15 MDs. This news service interviewed the business last summer about its work and approach to investing for clients such as family offices and endowments.

Murugesu serves as head of the West Coast office, which he established in 2019, after joining Partners Capital in its London office in 2013. Murugesu previously worked at Bain Capital Private Credit, Marshall Wace Asset Management and Vantage Investment Management.

At the MD level, the firm has promoted three client chief investment officers based in Boston – Anne Duggan, Leslie Fitzgerald, and Sam Hufton. It has also promoted Dr Michael Viehs, global head of sustainable investing, based in London.

Duggan is a client CIO, responsible for working with both institutional and private clients. Prior to joining Partners Capital in 2017, she was a director at Fidelity Investments, an investment associate at Credit Suisse and an investment banking analyst at Morgan Stanley.

Fitzgerald is a client CIO and member of the sustainable investment team at Partners Capital. Prior to joining the firm in 2017, Fitzgerald was an investment director at Cambridge Associates.

Hufton is a client CIO based in Boston. He originally joined the firm in 2009 in its London office where he was responsible for equities manager research. Prior to Partners Capital, he was an associate at Cazenove Capital in London.

Dr Viehs joined Partners Capital in 2022 as global head of sustainable Investing. Dr Viehs is responsible for developing the firm’s sustainable investing strategy and integrating ESG considerations into its investment processes. Previously, he was head of ESG integration at Federated Hermes Limited.

The firm employs more than 300 people across its seven offices in Boston, New York, London, San Francisco, Paris, Singapore, and Hong Kong. It has been operating in the OCIO space for 21 years, and advises families and institutions such as the endowment funds of Oxford and Cambridge in the UK and Syracuse University in the US. It also serves institutions in the arts, sciences and healthcare fields, such as the Metropolitan Opera Company and Cancer Research Institute.

The ascent of OCIOs such as Partners Capital reflects how some institutions, including multi-family and single-family offices, have found it easier and less expensive to farm out the job of making investments, and dispensing advice, rather than trying to do this in-house. Another example of an OCIO business is Hirtle Callagahan.