Asset managers will continue to use software companies to help with trading, analysis and trade settlement as spending on such activity is down by a quarter, according to Charles River Development.

Asset managers are “bottom line driven. They divest themselves of a lot of costly systems, data, staff,” says Cameron Field, managing director Asia Pacific at Charles River.

The financial software developer employs about 65 people in Asia. It has about 22 customers in Australia. In Asia Charles River has about 60 asset management clients.

Charles River’s competitors include BlackRock, Bloomberg LP, SunGard and Fidessa.

In Australia, Field says Charles River is “rolling out four projects” while “two others” are expected to sign up to do business with the company.

“Each fund manager is different,” says Field. But overall “spending on asset management information technology is down 25 per cent.”