W.R. Lazard & Co., New York, has acquired Pecksland Associates, Greenwich, Conn., an equity manager. Terms of the deal, which closed Feb. 7, were not disclosed.
Pecksland will be merged into W.R. Lazard Asset Management and its chairwoman, Phoebe Zaslove, has been named chief executive officer of the combined asset management entity, which will move to a new Boston office that will open shortly.
The combination of W.R. Lazard and Pecksland creates a firm with $1.4 billion in assets, including both domestic and international equity and fixed income, which forms a good platform for growth, said Marianne Camille Spraggins, CEO of W.R. Lazard & Co., the money manager's parent company. The merger creates several immediate opportunities for the firm to expand its business by offering new products to the existing client base, said Ms. Zaslove.
Additionally, the firm will expand its product offerings after the merger.
W.R. Lazard plans to launch cash management services and a global fixed-income product, as well as market Pecksland's existing socially responsible investment product, said Ms. Spraggins. Ms. Zaslove noted the firm also has plans to launch an international equity hedge fund using long and short strategies later this year.
