William Blair is to open a new office in Singapore, expanding its presence in Asia.This new office strengthens William Blair’s global investment management footprint, which includes an established presence in Europe (offices in the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland), Asia (Shanghai), and Australia, as well as in the United States.
The Singapore office is the most recent step in a period of significant international expansion for William Blair Investment Management, following the acquisition of an Emerging Markets Debt (EMD) team and subsequent launch of new investment strategies to complement its existing suite of SICAV products.
The firm has also announced the appointment of Clifford Lau, CFA, as a portfolio manager on its EMD team. Lau joins William Blair from Columbia Threadneedle Investments, where he was head of fixed income, Asia Pacific, was a senior portfolio manager responsible for managing Asian fixed-income assets, and was involved in product and business development. He was previously head of the Singapore office for Pramerica Fixed Income (the asset management division of Prudential Financial Inc.), where he was responsible for approximately USD1 billion of Asian fixed-income assets.
Lau will be based in William Blair’s new Singapore office and will be joined by Johnny Chen, CFA, who is an EMD portfolio manager. William Blair intends to add further investment and distribution professionals to support its presence in Singapore in due course.
Stephanie Braming, CFA, partner and global head of William Blair Investment Management, says: “2020 has been an exciting year for William Blair. Opening the Singapore office marks a pivotal point in our growth, providing us with a greater level of on-the-ground Asian coverage and insight than ever before. We are leveraging our deep heritage of global investing while creating a strong platform to deliver William Blair’s proven range of equities, fixed income, and multi-asset solutions to Asian investors.
“We are thrilled that Clifford Lau is joining our firm. This addition reflects William Blair’s continued commitment to give our clients access to the highest-quality investment professionals, and we believe his experience and extensive local market knowledge will prove a highly valuable enhancement to our fast-growing EMD franchise.”
