Barnett Waddingham has renewed its composer contract with wealth management and advice solutions technology provider, GBST.

Having provided SIPP technology to Barnett Waddingham through its composer platform since 2013, the reappointment means that GBST will continue to power Barnett Waddingham’s self invested personal pension (SIPP) administration via its composer platform. Commenting on the appointment, Barnett Waddingham CEO, Simon Foster, said: “GBST’s Composer has been instrumental to the success of our business. Without this stable platform at the core of our systems set, we would not be in a position to support our thousands of customers with the quality of service that Barnett Waddingham strives for. The upgrade of GBST’s Composer to a modern, cloud-native platform is in turn an enabler for the transformation of our own digital services and customer experience, as we look to maximise straight-through processing while continuing to differentiate ourselves from our competitors.”

The Access Pool has announced that it is seeking senior secured direct lending strategies in Europe and the United States.

The pool, which holds assets totalling around £45bn on behalf of participating Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) pension funds, is seeking to select senior secured direct lending strategies across two distinct mandates focusing on European and US markets, respectively. The initial allocations are expected to be around £200m for the European mandate and around £150m for the US mandate, although subsequent allocations are expected in future in both cases. The appointed funds/strategies will provide senior secured direct loans to corporates with a focus on the core middle market, to a mainly private equity sponsor-backed borrower base.

Canada Life has partnered with ELSA Next Generation, a not-for-profit organisation that provides targeted and transformational educational programmes to young people.

The partnership aims to address "critical gaps" in financial capability for young people in Hertfordshire and help boost career-readiness for those from less-advantaged socio-economic backgrounds. As part of the partnership, Canada Life will fund the development and delivery of interactive workshops. Led by trained facilitators, the workshops will aim to help young people navigate topical, real-world financial scenarios such as understanding payslips and planning pensions, to help equip them with essential skills that help lay a foundation for long-term financial security.

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