Jussi Kärävä, who has a long career in the service of large institutional investors, has joined the Board of the Sifter Fund. Kärävä has worked as a portfolio manager at Varma Mutual Pension Insurance Company and OP Asset Management where he led a team that was responsible for selecting the mutual funds used by OP in the Group’s products.
“Sifter’s investment strategy is very clear. There is a growing trend in the institutional field to invest globally instead of traditional geographical regions. That’s why I see a lot of growth potential at Sifter,” says Kärävä.
As a professional in the field, Kärävä was already acquainted with Sifter, and since last summer he has familiarised himself with the fund even more. Learning more about the fund has really convinced him.
“The product is in great shape.”
Last year, Kärävä started as a partner at NorthPeak Governance, which was established by Timo Kaisanlahti and Jarkko Matilainen. It is the first company in the Nordic countries to specialise in the board governance of funds.
NorthPeak Governance’s idea is to make the expertise of all of its employees available to all of its customers. Timo Kaisanlahti works as Professor of Practice in the Faculty of Law at the University of Helsinki. Jarkko Matilainen has worked at Varma for a long time. And the company’s fourth partner, Laura Männistö, is at Ilmarinen, a mutual pension insurance company.
NorthPeak Governance’s customers arecompanies that operate in international alternative investment funds in particular. The number of clients is limited to allow sufficient time for all funds.
In addition to the NorthPeak Governance quartet having solid experience in funds from an institutional investor perspective, the company invests in responsibility expertise (ESG).
“ESG is a topic everyone is talking about. In Scandinavia in particular, institutional investors want to see a written ESG policy before making an investment decision; and, these days, private investors are also more interested in responsibility,” says Kärävä.
The importance of responsibility aspects is growing all the time in other parts of the world as well.
