It earns an Above Average Parent rating.
Clive Gillmore co-founded this value-oriented boutique in the early 1990s and remains its CEO. He and his partners created the firm because the larger companies they worked for wanted them to launch strategies outside of their wheelhouse. Mondrian, in contrast, remains entirely devoted to a cautious value approach, focused mainly on equities. That dedication is admirable even though it can impact performance when value is out of favor. Manager and analyst retention is strong, helped by a policy of spreading equity ownership widely; more than half of the overall firm's 169 permanent staff (that is, excluding contractors) are partners, including most of the 58 investment professionals.
Gillmore, who is 64, plans to stay in a leadership position for five to 10 years, either as CEO or perhaps, in time, as executive chairman. Nonetheless, succession plans have been put into place, an action sometimes lacking at founder-led firms. He and colleagues have shared with the board the names of several younger potential successors, mostly from the investment side.