London, June 23, 2020: London-based research analysis provider Substantive Research today announces the hire of Drew Hermann to serve as Head of Sales, Americas, part of the firm’s rapid expansion plan to build out its North American operations. In his role, Drew will work closely with asset managers to source quality, differentiated research while also optimizing their investment research budget.

The findings indicate that the value asset managers place on one-to-one interactions with analysts has fallen by 47% since the pandemic began and all physical meetings became virtual. Group meetings fared only slightly better, with the rates paid for virtual as opposed to face-to-face meetings dropping by 35%.

Drew brings over a decade of investment research market experience across the United States, Canada, and LATAM along with a background in strategic management, product development, and enterprise sales.

Mike Carrodus, CEO and Founder of Substantive Research, said, “Drew comes to us after an incredibly successful few years as Managing Director, Global Business Development at Ned Davis Research, one of the largest independent research providers in the market. His understanding of how asset managers use and value research will ensure that we deepen our existing relationships in North America and expand in the region as a whole.”

Founded in early 2015, Substantive Research has built up an extensive clientele of global asset managers and hedge funds with its solutions that help institutional investors navigate the unprecedented structural changes in the pricing and supply of investment research, accelerated by investment research unbundling regulations implemented as part of MiFID II.

Whilst much of the impact was initially felt in Europe and the UK, US firms are now unbundling their research and execution costs to adopt best practice processes in the way they source, value, and budget for investment research, which Substantive’s content and pricing databases are uniquely able to provide.