Research Operations

Overview

The primary goal of research and investment teams at hedge funds, asset managers, brokerages, research houses, family offices, and private wealth managers is to generate investment ideas and alpha. While research remains their core activity, peripheral operational activities constitute an integral part of the research process.

Increasing requirements related to internal and external reporting, compounding client and research touchpoints, growing data management challenges and opportunities, and the need to stand out among competitors, have been quite challenging for business managers. Employee attrition and finding the right talent in a progressively dynamic business environment have made the situation more complex. Business managers have been looking for flexible solutions externally to help improve the quality of research, improve client experience, and expand business operations while keeping costs in check.

At Acuity, we partner with research and investment teams to manage a host of these peripheral research operational tasks, such as customer relationship management (CRM) and data management, broker vote management, expense and invoice tracking, business intelligence support (including readability statistics, custom charting and powerful dashboards, and interactive visualization via Tableau and PowerBI), and research admin support, including personal assistants.

With this, Acuity also helps clients eliminate the time spent on managing the functions – hiring, training, and retaining –as clients are able to tap into Acuity’s large pool of experienced and skilled resources with relevant domain expertise.

Who we serve

Research Operations support we offer

Customer relationship management (CRM) and data management

De-duplication of data such as client, account and client activity details
Regular bulk cleansing using SQL to ensure real-time data quality
Bridging data gaps using third-party databases and Python codes
Data validation and migration
Data management and ongoing administration
End-to-end CRM implementation of Salesforce, Dynamics, DealCloud, etc.
Deployment of CRM administrators, developers and business analysts to support implementation

Business intelligence

Readability statistics
Commission reports
KPI trackers
Custom charting and powerful dashboards
Interactive visualisations through tools including Tableau and PowerBI

Corporate Access Solutions

Event updates and corporate access database management
Calendar management (including meetings and training schedules)
Event status reports, feedback analysis
On-the-ground support in China

Expense & Invoice Management Services

Travel & expenses process management
Data subscription & other vendor invoice process management
Reconciliation with contracts & internal processes
Approval coordination with different stakeholders and authorisation points
End-to-end process management until final payment is completed
Periodic reports and analysis

Broker Vote Management

Scorecard template design
Book-keeping of broker votes
Automated scorecard and MIS
Customized MIS/dashboard/scorecards for COO teams
Integrating with internal databases

Operational & Research Admin Support

Executive/Personal assistant support
Calendar management
Travel management
Onboarding and providing entitlement access to clients
Day-to-day operational support including meeting schedules, meeting notes & filing
Consumption reporting