Redington chief Mitesh Sheth was appointed by co-founder Rob Gardner to help the company answer a crucial question- should it move into fiduciary management? The job involves consultants in the day-to-day management of investments, effectively making them a halfway house between consultants and fund managers. The sector was already growing rapidly as more pension trustees looked to pass on responsibility for decision-making to professional advisers. A disrupter in the stuffy world of investment advice, Sheth said, “We have the audacity and desire to change investing.”
Redington has broken the mould, clawing out a five per cent market share. Sheth, who began his career at one of the industry titans, said he feels far more comfortable as a plucky outsider. He speaks rather evangelically of Redington's “mission” to help “100m people become financially secure.” Born in the north of England, he grew up in Crawley, near Gatwick airport, 28 miles south of London. His father had trained as an accountant in Kenya but in the UK his parents ran corner shops and post offices. At the London School of Economics, Sheth studied actuarial science. He also received an offer from Aon to become an investment analyst but put it on hold to take a year out in India, his parents' ancestral home. He studied Sanskrit, philosophy, yoga and meditation. He later returned to Britain, spreadsheets replaced yogic manuscripts as he resumed his investment career, analysing fund managers and advising pension scheme trustees. He then joined Henderson Global Investors under the tutelage of David Jacob, then chief investment officer and now interim chief executive of GAM, the crisis-hit Swiss fund manager. He rose to become head of fixed income at Henderson.
Sheth realised he wanted to spend more time with his young family by 2012, and set up as independent consultant. He said his recommendation to Redington has been vindicated. “In the past five years we have won so many big clients from our peers. The reason most of them is that we are able to show we offer independent advice,” he said. Meeting rooms at Redington are chosen to remind staff of the pension members of their biggest clients, the engine room for Rolls-Royce, the mail room for Royal Mail, and the newsroom for Reuters. The company reported £18m of revenue last year, up 22 per cent the year before.
Sheth joined Redington full-time in 2013 and was made chief executive in 2016. His pitch for the top job included making 100m people financially secure. As a result, the company is branching out from its core area of advising final salary pension schemes into a broader range of investment consulting services. This includes offering tools and advice to intermediaries with wealth management and retail clients, as well as becoming more of a fintech business. Redington has a longstanding affiliation with St James' Place, the UK wealth manager, to which Gardner moved recently as director of investments. Sheth also points to the company's relationships with Chinese insurers, helping them manage risk.
