AnaCap Financial has bought the Novia platform, the private equity firm’s third acquisition in the UK wealth management platform space in the past 12 months.
The firms announced today (December 15) AnaCap had bought Novia in a move which brings £8.15bn of assets, 67,000 clients and more than 1,000 advice firms to its growing platform book.
It follows AnaCap’s acquisitions of Wealthtime in December last year and Amber Financial Investments in July 2020.
Across the three platforms, AnaCap now boasts nearly £11bn assets under management and said it would continue to deploy its “expertise in tech-enabled businesses” to bolster the firms.
Bill Vasilieff, chief executive at Novia, said: “Novia was keen to partner with a company that had a strong track record in growing fintech businesses with innovative operational strategies.
“We believe that AnaCap represents the perfect choice to help us develop and, pending completion, we look forward to an exciting new chapter for the company in 2021 and beyond.”
Nassim Cherchali, partner for M&A at AnaCap, said it was an “exciting acquisition” and a “truly fundamental deal” in the firm’s strategy across the UK wealth management platform space.
He added: “The investment means we have vastly increased our fund management and technological capabilities.
“We look forward to this next chapter, working with Novia’s impressive technology platform to increase its growth via planned investments into distribution and the building of in-house asset management capabilities.”
The pace of merger and acquisitions activity in the platforms market has been on the up over the past few years.
Last November Embark’s expansion in the platform space continued with the company’s acquisition of the Zurich platform, just months after it bought the advised business of Alliance Trust Savings from Interactive Investor.
Interactive Investor later went on to buy its rival The Share Centre while M&G bought the Ascentric platform from Royal London.
Meanwhile, James Hay and Transact are currently involved in a bidding war for adviser wrap platform Nucleus.
Private equity firms, such as in the case of Epiris and AnaCap, have also increasingly reared their heads into the platform world.
imogen.tew@ft.com
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