Artemis staff happy to stay put as takeover looms

The top brass at Edinburgh based fund manager, Artemis, have sold their stake in the business to majority shareholder Fortis. It was a big pay-day for the firm's founding quartet, and Fortis has promised to safeguard jobs and preserve the boutique culture.

Fortis has made no secret of its desire to sell its stake in Artemis, and the move will give it the freedom to sell the entire firm to interested parties.

John Todd and Mark Tyndall, senior members of the founding team at Artemis, have received 50m apiece for selling their stakes in the business to the troubled Belgian-Dutch bank for 317.2m.

The other two founders, Derek Stuart and Lindsay Whitelaw, are also understood to have netted 26m and 19m, respectively. Senior team members Philip Wolstencraft and Adrian Frost, who joined Artemis in 1999, are thought to have received 24m and 18m as a result of the deal.

Artemis is still a nimble organisation, employing 12 other asset managers and Fortis has been quick to point out that no redundancies were on the horizon.

More of a worry, perhaps, would be the erosion of the boutique culture if a major player takes eventually buys the firm. In recent months Federated Investors, Franklin Templeton and Putnam have been linked with a takeover.

Is the takeover likely to spur Artemis staff to look elsewhere, or will they become prime targets for headhunters? One thinks not.

"Fortis has its own problems and it's made it clear that it'll largely leave Artemis as it as, so I doubt many employees would head for the door.

"If competitors want to poach them, they'd have to offer them more money and, though the fund managers might still be talking a bullish game, the reality is few are willing to offer big money for staff at the moment."

However, Fortis seems to be keen not to do anything to rock the boat and says it will preserve Artemis's "entrepreneurial environment" and that the management would be "fully involved" with discussions over the future of the company.