LAB Managed Portfolio Solution - a collaboration between 3 companies (Entireti (the parent company of advice businesses, including Akumin, Fortnum Private Wealth, Personal Financial Services, and Entireti Alliances) has taken out the Innovation category in the 2025 IMAP Managed Account Awards.

For eight years, IMAP has celebrated excellence in the Australian managed accounts market through the IMAP Managed Account Awards, with the Innovation category at the forefront of showcasing the evolution of the sector.

This year’s award went to LAB Managed Portfolio Solution for a new category of tailored managed portfolios. For Sarah McCarthy CFP^® — Head of Portfolio Solutions at Entireti — winning the IMAP Award for Innovation is a proud moment for Entireti (the parent company of advice businesses, including Akumin, Fortnum Private Wealth, Personal Financial Services, and Entireti Alliances), as it recognises the group’s leadership in launching a new category of managed accounts into the market — the LAB Managed Portfolio Solution.

By Jayson Forrest

According to Sarah, this solution is a first of its kind in the Australian market, as it enables tailored managed portfolios to be accessed by more advice practices, which previously didn’t have the scale or ability to do so.

Essentially, LAB Managed Portfolios draw on BlackRock’s 30-year multi-asset investment track record and its global custom managed portfolio technology, along with Lonsec Investment Solutions’ manager research and selection capabilities, to support Entireti to deliver portfolio customisation at scale to its adviser network.

In considering what makes the LAB Managed Portfolios innovative, Sarah says historically, many advice practices were unable to adopt managed accounts due to the unsuitability of ‘off-the-shelf’ solutions, as a result of manager incumbency or preferences within existing portfolios, as well as the lack of scale required to access fully tailored managed portfolios.

“However, thanks to this innovation, Entireti is helping both practices within our network, as well as the increasing number of advisers who operate under their own AFSL, to take full advantage of a pioneering managed portfolio solution – one that offers customisation to suit a practice’s individual requirements and investment philosophy,” says Sarah.

“We see this as an evolution of managed accounts to support the industry. The LAB Managed Portfolios will help increase the overall adoption of managed accounts by advisers, enabling the use of managed accounts across more of an adviser’s client base. This solution tackles some of the challenges that previously prevented the adoption of this structure by advisers. We believe this innovation will ultimately allow advisers to serve more clients, which will help support the industry’s objective of reducing the advice gap.”

Sarah adds the proliferation of model portfolios has presented large licensees with investment governance challenges — specifically, the need for licensee research and compliance teams to oversee an increasingly large number of ‘off-the-shelf’ SMAs, private-labelled SMAs, and individual account level customisation of models on platforms offering this functionality.

“The LAB Managed Portfolio Solution allows the streamlining of governance for the licensee and responsible entity (RE), enabling the oversight of custom iterations of a parent portfolio at scale, while improving the monitoring program and risk management across a large number of SMAs,” says Sarah.

To illustrate the point, Sarah says some advice practices have been unable to benefit from managed accounts because they have not had the required scale to fully access tailored model portfolios. In most cases, this is because they must initially commit a sizeable amount (about $200 million) in client funds, as well as fund the costs of the investment consultant, and create the scheme/MIS once a platform and RE has been selected. And ‘off-the-shelf’ solutions may simply not be suitable, due to manager incumbency or preferences within existing client portfolios.

“However, LAB aims to solve these issues and expand the availability of managed accounts to more advice businesses with high quality governance oversight,” says Sarah.

Not surprisingly, Entireti, BlackRock and Lonsec Investment Solutions are delighted to have been recognised in the Innovation category of the 2025 IMAP Managed Account Awards for the LAB Managed Portfolio Solution. “This award celebrates excellence and innovation in the managed accounts industry, and we’re honoured to be acknowledged,” says Sarah.

In congratulating LAB for taking out the Innovation category, Toby Potter — IMAP Chair and Awards judge — says the quality and number of entries in this category continues to grow, reflecting the maturity of the managed accounts market in Australia.

According to Toby, managed accounts have become one of the fastest growing parts of the advice profession because they provide advisers and licensees with a superior way of delivering better client outcomes that more closely align with the goals of clients.

“We are seeing continued evolution of the technology and portfolio management capability in managed accounts,” he says.“We are demanding ever higher standards of ourselves as a profession and this is reflected in the innovation and standard of portfolio management we’re seeing in managed accounts.”

According to Toby, the IMAP Managed Account Awards are only possible due to the commitment of the judges who dedicated considerable time and their professional expertise in assessing the many entries in these awards.

This year’s judges’ panel comprised of:

• Deanne Baker — Deputy Chief Investment Strategist at Evidentia;
• Brad Matthews — Founding Director at Brad Matthews Investment Strategies;
• Dominic McCormick — Industry Consultant;
• Nigel Douglas — Principal of Douglas Funds Consulting;
• Rob da Silva — Head of Research at Foresight Analytics;
• Chetan Trehan — Sector Head Real Assets, Alternatives and Multi-Asset Funds at SQM Research; and
• Toby Potter — Chair of IMAP and Executive Director of Philo Capital Advisers.

IMAP is grateful for the support of SQM Research in sponsoring the Innovation award category.