SEARCHES & HIRINGS
California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, committed to 13 venture capital funds as part of its plan to reach a 25% allocation to alternatives in five years.
The $1 billion fund committed between $5 million and $10 million each to the following fund managers: Knightsbridge, Brinson Partners, Accel, Foundation Capital, Sequoia Capital, Sevin Rosen, CHL Medical Partners, Prospect Partners, Whitney Equity Partners, Industrial Growth Partners, Freeman Spogli, Sprout Capital and Thomas Lee.
The commitments will be funded by a rebalancing from the equity portfolio, said Philip Halpern, CIO. The search was done in-house.
Pennsylvania Automotive Association, Harrisburg, Pa., selected Prudential Investments as bundled provider for a new 401(k) program for PAA's 1,400 member dealers. The plan will offer dealers the opportunity to select from among 300 mutual funds offered in the PruArray program.
PruArray includes Prudential's proprietary funds and funds from 11 other companies. PAA dealers have about 60,000 employees.
World Color Press Inc., Greenwich, Conn., hired Putnam Investments as bundled provider for its $160 million 401(k) plan. Putnam will provide record-keeping and administration services and seven of the nine investment funds. Other funds will be provided by Neuberger & Berman and Fidelity.
A World Color spokesman declined to name the previous service providers.
Opthalmic Mutual Insurance Co., San Francisco, hired Prime Advisors to manage its $45 million general account assets. Prime will manage the assets in a fix-income portfolio with an average maturity of 5 years to 15 years.
OMIC officials declined to name the asset manager that previously was used, but said the change was caused by a change in the investment staff at the existing manager.
Conseco Inc., Carmel, Ind., hired AMR Investment to manage a new international stock mutual fund. AMR will invest the assets in the international equity portfolio of its AMR Investment Services Trust. The international portion of AMR's trust is in turn managed by subadvisers Hotchkis & Wiley, Morgan Stanley and Templeton Investment.
Conseco also added two funds to be managed by its Conseco Capital Management subsidiary: the Conseco 20 Fund, a concentrated portfolio of about 20 stocks; and the High Yield Fund, a bond fund that seeks high current income first and capital appreciation second.
