International Centre for Pension Management

Anton Timmermans, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Dutch industry pension fund Bedrijfspensioen, has to make a decision on short notice on how to respond to a surprise letter he received last evening. The letter, sent by Richard de Ridder, Chief Executive Officer of SCALE N.V., referred to a strategy document in which the Executive Board of SCALE brought forward a view on its long-term strategy in the European pension market for the next five years. The main message of the letter and strategy document was an informal request to remove the current third-party restriction that SCALE faced regarding its client base. A list of endorsements by Supervisory Board members of SCALE was also included.
Three years ago, Bedrijfspensioen and Pensioenkas had set up SCALE as a so-called pension delivery organization (PDO).2    Bedrijfspensioen was originally set up in the early 1960s when an increasing number of small businesses emerged in the Netherlands.3 Pensioenkas was another Dutch medium-sized industry pension fund responsible for the pension arrangement of accountants. Today, both pension funds equally own fifty percent of the shares of SCALE, which is structured as a Dutch public limited liability corporation or Naamloze Vennootschap (N.V.). Since the start of its activities, SCALE has been restricted to providing pension services to its current shareholders. Anton was one of the Board members that had been actively involved in establishing SCALE and defining its mission. At inception, it was clearly agreed that SCALE should fully focus on managing the assets of the two pension fund clients, who happen to be shareholders as well.