With the recent expansion of Granite's investment capabilities through the addition of 9 new investment professionals, the firm needed greater processing depth and power. Granite sought to outsource its back- and middle-office functions as a means of expanding its infrastructure without tying up critical internal resources.

"We brought on a well-regarded new team of managers who brought with them a large and diverse client base - and our infrastructure had to scale quickly to support that growth," said Geoff Edelstein, Principal and Portfolio Manager of Granite Investment Partners. "We chose to outsource because we wanted to be able to focus on managing investments and satisfying our clients instead of worrying about whether we have the best operations platforms in place or building out our back-office infrastructure. We chose SEI because of its expertise in this area and because it's done this successfully more than anyone in the industry."

"When it comes to operations, outsourcing is no longer the exception, it's the rule," said John Alshefski, Senior Vice President, SEI's Investment Manager Services division. "Whether they are growing or just starting out, today's firms would rather focus on their business growth and not their operational growth. At SEI, we've spent a tremendous amount of time and resources ensuring our platform and our processes provide the flexibility, the scalability, and the quality that our clients need regardless of their business model. Granite is growing rapidly and wanted to avoid the typical operational growing pains - our goal is to give them the infrastructure and stability they need to handle long-term future growth."

Under the agreement, SEI will provide Granite with a full range of services for the firm's separate accounts, including account administration, trade processing, account and trade reconciliation, performance calculation and reporting, investment accounting, manager trade support, daily ay and month-end performance measurement, and end-client reporting and billing. Granite will receive comprehensive data management, performance, and risk reporting for all middle-office services provided by SEI. SEI's deep experience across asset classes and investment vehicles and the company's proven track record of outsourcing success were pointed to as key factors in the decision-making process.