Signs that the marriage of BT and Principal in the middle of last year will produce further cross-pollination continue as another Principal executive joins BT Funds Management in Australia.
Signs that the marriage of BT and Principal in the middle of last year will produce further cross-pollination continue as another Principal executive joins BT Funds Management in Australia.
Dan McGee is to join Principal colleague Carey Jury in Australia to take on a sen-ior position in BT Funds Management’s (BTFM) corporate investments services business.
Jury has recruited a number of Principal executives to Australia since the takeover of BT, including Sue Palmer, Barbara McKenzie and David Fallow who are all fo-cussing on the corporate superannuation market.
The addition of McGee is indicative of BTFM’s focus on the master trust market and will see him concentrate on expanding the role of financial planners as a distri-bution channel for master trust products.
McGee has been with the Principal Financial Group for eight years and involved in the sale of 401(k) and pension plans as regional sales vice president, overseeing 15 sales offices.
The move of McGee into the Australian operation was driven by Jury, who is ex-ecutive vice president for BT Funds Management, and previously based with Prin-cipal in the US as vice president of group operations. He now heads up corporate super and master trusts in Australia.
Jury’s role is to expand retirement services and institutional asset management us-ing systems manufactured in the US.
“Mine is a two to three year assignment. We are aiming to bring the synergies be-tween the two groups together in the areas of marketing and distribution of these products,” Jury says.
At the end of 1999 corporate super and master trust assets under management had broken the $500 million mark with 1600 employer clients and 45,000 employee members.
While Jury is happy with this figure he says there is room to improve and a vigor-ous effort to lift the numbers is underway.
“We started in September last year and have expanded our focus with the addition of business development managers in each of the states. Our target is to be in the top five by market share by 2004 up from number 16 at present.”
