Dakota Funds Group is a 3rd party marketing firm that specializes in raising capital for active boutique investment management firms and their strategies. Founded in 2006, Dakota has raised ~$20 billion for 15 different investment management strategies and is located in Bryn Mawr, PA, with 10 employees.Our View of the World: We live in a world that has undergone an enormous amount of change in the past ten years. Passive investing continues its assault on active management. The number of due diligence analysts (our buyers), has been dramatically reduced across all channels due to margin issues and the independent RIA channel continues its rapid growth, making it a more and more important channel but far less efficient to access because RIAs are a decentralized group.These factors make the distribution of investment strategies more difficult because you have a competitor who is cheap, performs and is easy to understand (active strategies are opaque and generally hard to understand). You have a dwindling number of buyers and your targeted investors are more spread out than ever before, steadily hurting the efficiencies you once had in selling to a more aggregated group of buyers. However, if a firm wants to grow, they must find ways to distribute their products.At Dakota, we specialize in growing active, boutique investment firms in the channels most appropriate for their product structures. Most of the firms we work with have mutual funds and separate accounts and the primary channels we sell to are RIAs, Multi-Family Offices, Banks, Broker Dealers and Institutional Consultants. With seven sales people in the field, we have been able to rapidly scale our clients funds and strategies.We believe the trends mentioned above will continue, making raising capital for boutique firms ever more competitive. However, there are many creative ways to address these trends and make the process of accessing capital much easier.

Responsible for overall strategic formulation and execution of technology at Equity Institutional-Directed Trustee Services. Managed multiple applications for business line responsible for over 200,000 customers and $22 Billion Dollars in Assets for 2+ years with 99.95% up-time. Managed team of 7 - 9 professionals which performed production support and developed and implemented new software that increased efficiency and enabled operations to reduce operational overhead by 10% Managed external vendors and worked with them to set appropriate SLAs on software support which reduced time to resolution by over 50%. Responsible for change management - utilizing Agile - Waterfall methodologies - to implement both bug fixes and enhancements. Worked closely with the business teams in building requirements, creating design documents, and assisting in their understanding and performing testing in Dev, Test, Stage, and Production. Worked closely with Compliance and Audit to review existing and develop new processes and procedures for business line. From this review, we developed and successfully tested disaster recovery and fail over plans and to ensure consistent services availability and delivery to our clients. Provided mentoring and coaching to staff. Responsible for creating and aligning technology road map with corporate strategy. Provided oversight and troubleshooting to staff in Delaware . Communicated progress and capital expenditure on a continuous basis to CTO and executive management. Created process and procedures to ensure timely issue resolutions and escalations.

Responsible for all IT of a multi-branch community bank Reported directly to the COO and managed team of 4 - 8 professionals performing production support, new software deployment, virtualization, etc. Managed external vendors and negotiated new contracts for IT Department which reduced capital expenditures by 10%. Created a new process for the CFO to assist in the valuation of the stock price and decisions regarding share repurchase and dividend increases. Responsible for internal audits as well as annual exams from Federal and State regulatory bodies. Trained employees on Information Security and the security policies of the bank. Responsible for project management for the rollout of new bank branches, VoIP deployment, Virturalization (VMware), etc. Deployed and managed new security systems including RSA VPN access to allow executives to work remotely. Restructured loan pipeline process which reduced operational overhead by 15% and accelerated the Request to Approval/Denial time by over 25%.

Project management for Adobe CS5 deployment to Campbell Soup Company’s Graphic Design department. Provided hands-on management of multiple client networks of various sizes and levels of complexity. Handled a full range of tasks, from server troubleshooting to user desktop issues. Planned projects and provided superior service to clients.

Managed the technology planning and execution of mobile networks and virtual office spaces for Oppenheimer Capital’s remote office in West Conshohocken, PA. Administered organization-wide needs-assessment; identified critical training needs and requirements for Archbrook Capital. Communicated detailed product knowledge to support consulting engagements. Defined and directed project goals, objectives, and risk factors to ensure successful implementation of solutions.

Managed all technology needs, budgeting, planning, execution and implementation for the Investment Management Firm. Built custom reports to increase productivity of research databases and portfolio management. Supported users of Advent Axys, Bloomberg, and FactSet. Performed stock screening, researched companies financials, built dividend discount models, and presented findings to Investment committee. Worked directly with clients and end users to provide assistance and maintain quality assurance. Established, tested and implemented procedures for the firm’s disaster recovery program. Maintained firm’s website. Daily troubleshooting of computer issues. Created marketing materials for the firm. Jointly managed client investment portfolios.

• Provided assistance to both Spanish and English speaking retirement plan participants.• Provided retirement technical assistance, account status information and current information about investment options available in the participant’s plan. • Explained plan provisions and procedures to the participant. • Handled exchanges and investment redirection requests. • Initiated account research to resolve service problems or respond to an inquiry.

• Instructed students in the use of software programs. • Responsible for fixing both software and hardware problems. • Troubleshooting of various printers, desktops, and laptops.• Supervised 25 students.

• Built out high-speed network to on-campus buildings.• Monitored network for bandwidth violations.• Responsible for daily troubleshooting of network connectivity problems.• Assisted students, staff, and faculty in the roll-out of wireless internet on campus.