Leading asset management firms are upping their investments in technology at a substantially greater rate than the rest of the industry, according to a survey conducted by FIS.
The part of the survey that focuses on asset management reveals that leaders within the industry have prioritized effective data management strategies, drawing more heavily on the cloud to access the data infrastructure they need and move away from legacy information technology, as well as implementing open application programming interfaces.
Of the asset managers surveyed, 89% of leaders have centralized organizational data, vs. 51% of the rest of the industry. Meanwhile, 58% of leaders have put applications in the public cloud, compared with 15% of the rest of the industry.
"Through technology investments, you have a group of industry-leading firms in the sector growing at a faster rate than the rest of the industry, and that rate of growth is accelerating," said Tony Warren, executive vice president, head of strategy and solutions management at FIS, in a phone interview.
Mr. Warren added that "scale is absolutely a factor" in terms of which firms are considered the leaders in adopting and investing in new technology.
Survey results also revealed that 45% of leaders within the money management industry have implemented open application programming interfaces to enable them to provide the data they need for internal and external clients, vs. 17% of the rest of the industry.
In addition, most of the leaders (81%) are highly satisfied with their ability to operationalize data to manage regulatory demand, compared with 33% of the rest of the industry.
Only 2% of the rest of the industry has deployed an artificial intelligence technology, while 24% of the money management leaders have done so. Of the firms deploying AI, 38% of leaders are developing chatbots.
Many managers leading the charge toward investing in technology are currently looking to do so to improve upon clients' experiences. According to the survey, 45% of leaders have already introduced online portals to deliver real-time reporting to clients, while only 17% of the rest of the industry has done the same.
"It'll be interesting to see how technology may redisrupt how the industry is working today," Mr. Warren said.
He also noted that the adoption of new technology will also aid managers looking to pursue ESG investments.
"I think we'll continue to see technology enable that investments are going into environmentally friendly assets," Mr. Warren added.
For its third annual Readiness Report, FIS surveyed 376 senior executives within the asset management industry and 158 fund administrators between December and March.