The Openwork Partnership has joined the shortlist of bidders for Benchmark, the financial planning and adviser services business owned by Schroders, in a potential deal worth up to £250m.
Openwork, which is backed by Bain Capital, is understood to be one of three remaining contenders for the business. Soderberg, part-owned by KKR, and Advent International are also thought to be in the running.
The sale process is being run by Perella Weinberg Partners and comes as Schroders prepares to be absorbed into Nuveen, the Chicago-based asset management group. The proposed Schroders-Nuveen combination will create a group with nearly $2.5tn in assets under management across institutional and wealth channels.
Benchmark was established in 1993 under the name Ian Cooke & Partners. It now has more than £26bn in assets under administration and employs hundreds of people. Alongside financial planning, it provides technology and compliance services to other financial advisers.
Schroders first took a stake in Benchmark in 2016 and took full control of the business two years later. Benchmark has since become part of Schroders’ broader wealth management offering, sitting alongside businesses such as Cazenove Capital.
The potential sale reflects continuing restructuring across UK wealth and asset management. Schroders’ agreed sale to Nuveen has already marked the end of more than two centuries of independence for one of London’s best-known investment houses. A Benchmark disposal would further simplify the combined group’s structure while allowing a buyer to acquire a scaled adviser platform with recurring revenue characteristics.
Openwork’s interest is notable because it is already one of the UK’s largest financial advice networks. Adding Benchmark would expand its reach across advice, technology, compliance, and platform services, strengthening its position in a market where scale is becoming increasingly important.
Financial advice has become attractive to private equity and strategic buyers because of its fragmented structure, recurring fee streams, and the long-term demand created by pension freedoms, retirement planning, inheritance tax concerns, and the transfer of financial responsibility from institutions to individuals.
At the same time, advice businesses are facing rising regulatory and technology costs. The Financial Conduct Authority’s consumer duty has increased expectations around client outcomes, documentation, governance, and ongoing service evidence. Technology platforms, compliance support, and centralised investment propositions are becoming more valuable as advisers seek to serve clients efficiently while managing risk.
Benchmark sits at the intersection of those trends. It provides financial planning services directly, but also supplies technology and compliance infrastructure to other advisers. That gives it more than one route to growth: acquiring or supporting advice practices, expanding platform services, and embedding tools that help advisers manage client suitability, reporting, and portfolio oversight.
The sale process also highlights a shift in the economics of wealth management. Traditional asset managers are under pressure from passive investment products, fee compression, and global scale advantages held by US groups. Wealth and advice businesses can offer closer client relationships and more stable distribution, but they require operational investment and regulatory discipline.
Benchmark’s attraction lies in the size of its assets under administration and its position within adviser infrastructure. A platform with more than £26bn under administration gives an acquirer immediate scale, although the value of the deal will depend on retention of adviser relationships, technology quality, compliance record, and the ability to integrate without disrupting client service.
Private equity interest points to confidence that further consolidation is possible. The UK advice market remains highly fragmented, with many smaller practices facing succession challenges, higher compliance demands, and pressure to invest in technology. Scaled networks and consolidators can offer exit routes for owners while building centralised capabilities.
Consolidation carries cultural and service risks. Advice businesses are relationship-led, and clients often remain loyal to individual advisers rather than platform brands. Buyers therefore have to balance efficiency and central control with the local trust that underpins client retention.
Schroders’ combination with Nuveen is designed to create a larger global active asset manager able to compete more effectively with US and passive-investing giants. Benchmark’s future ownership will show whether adviser infrastructure remains strategic to the enlarged group or is more valuable in the hands of a specialist advice network or financial sponsor.
A successful Openwork bid would reinforce its position as one of the major scaled players in UK advice. For Schroders and Nuveen, a sale would mark another step in reshaping the business around areas where global scale, investment capability, and client distribution are most valuable.
The process will test how much buyers are willing to pay for adviser infrastructure at a point when demand for advice is rising, while regulation, technology investment, and integration execution are all becoming more demanding.
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