GERMANY - Fund manager Cominvest has appointed Volker Kurr as its new head of institutional business, effective immediately.

Kurr joins Cominvest from SEB Invest, the German asset management arm of Swedish bank SEB, where he had been chief executive since October 2003.

Cominvest said that despite his many years of experience in the German institutional market, the 40-year-old Kurr had “special expertise in product development and strategic market”.

Friedrich Schmitz, chief executive of Cominvest, hailed the move as “another step toward the lucrative expansion of our business and the consolidation of our position as a leading asset manager in Germany”.

At the end of the first quarter, Cominvest says it had €29.6bn in institutional assets under management. This compares with €28bn at the end of 2004.

For all of 2005, Cominvest expects inflows to its institutional funds of between €500-€700m. Kurr’s former employer SEB Invest has of €7bn in AUM, €2.9bn of which are institutional assets.

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