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Global Sovereign Wealth Fund
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Sovereign Wealth & Public Pension
6 months

Global Sovereign Wealth Fund

A major sovereign wealth fund required a governance overhaul to compete effectively for high-demand private equity and infrastructure assets while maintaining rigorous risk controls.

Client Background

The fund manages over $400 billion in assets with a mandate to diversify national wealth and secure long-term intergenerational equity. Despite a talented investment team, legacy governance structures designed for public markets were stifling agility in private market transactions.

Challenge

The fund's investment committee (IC) process was cumbersome, often requiring 4-5 rounds of approval for standard deals. This latency caused the fund to lose exclusivity on competitive transactions. Furthermore, different asset class teams (Real Estate, PE, Infrastructure) used divergent risk models, making portfolio-level risk aggregation impossible for the CRO.

Solution

1Governance diagnostic and benchmarking
2Investment Committee charter redesign
3Delegated authority framework implementation
4Unified risk underwriting template creation
5Deal flow management system optimization

Implementation Process

Diagnostic & Benchmarking

6 weeks
  • Interviewed 30+ IC members and deal leads
  • Benchmarked governance speed against peer SWFs and Canadian pensions
  • Mapped end-to-end deal approval process flows
  • Identified 12 critical bottlenecks in the approval chain
  • Presented 'State of Governance' report to the Board

Framework Redesign

8 weeks
  • Drafted new IC charter with tiered approval limits
  • Created 'Fast-Track' protocol for re-ups and standard co-investments
  • Standardized investment memos to 15 pages max (previously 50+)
  • Defined clear veto rights vs. consensus requirements
  • Established 'Deal Triage' weekly meetings

Pilot & Rollout

10 weeks
  • Piloted new process with Private Equity team
  • Trained 150+ investment professionals on new templates
  • Implemented automated workflow in deal management system
  • Launched new risk aggregation dashboard for the CRO
  • Conducted post-mortem on first 5 deals under new system

Project Outcomes

Operational Efficiency

Dramatically faster capital deployment and reduced administrative burden on investment teams.

IC Memos
50+ pages15 pages standard
+70% reduction
Approval Time
8 weeks avg3 weeks avg
+62% faster
Deal Capacity
15 deals/year28 deals/year
+85% increase

Risk Management

Enhanced portfolio-level visibility and consistent underwriting standards across asset classes.

Risk Data Coverage
40% of portfolio100% of portfolio
+Full visibility
Policy Breaches
Frequent waiversZero waivers
+Strict adherence
Scenario Analysis
Ad-hocAutomated daily
+Real-time monitoring
Blue Cedarwood didn't just give us a theoretical governance model; they helped us operationalize it. We are now moving at the speed of a direct investor while maintaining the discipline of a sovereign fiduciary. The impact on our deal access has been immediate.
H.E. Al-Mansouri/Chief Strategy Officer, Global SWF

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