The secret sauce behind a concept that has worked for a decade

This is the story of how the Hedge Funds Club went from an idea to a major Asian network about to celebrate its ten-year anniversary.

In early 2005 I came up with the idea of setting up the Hedge Funds Club as an informal network for hedge fund managers and investors in Tokyo. I was quite new in town, managing a small start-up hedge fund firm and didn’t know that many local hedge fund managers and investors. What to do? Start building a network.

Some people told me it couldn’t work. How could it?! That got me motivated to make sure it would work. It did. And it still does. I’m still motivated. Soon enough we expanded into Singapore and Hong Kong. For the past decade we have hosted many successful events, each attended by hundreds of people, in Tokyo, Singapore and Hong Kong.

Ten years on from hosting that first event at Ark Hills in Tokyo in June 2005, it is time to reflect on why the simple concept of the Hedge Funds Club has worked for all these years and why it continues to work.

Here are my thoughts:

We are a network for and by hedge fund professionals

We live and breathe hedge funds. We are not just some event management people, marketing people, salespeople, publishers or media types who just decided to run some hedge fund events. We are hedge fund managers and investors who know this industry as we work in it every day. Our target market is our industry colleagues.

We enjoy what we do

We are having fun running this network. If people do not enjoy what they do, they won’t be working as hard, won’t be committed and won’t be as successful.

It works for us and it works for everybody

As fund managers and investors, we make use of our Hedge Funds Club contacts in our everyday businesses. But the reason why this network really works, is that all people who are involved benefit from it. Investors meet fund managers, fund managers meet investors, fund managers meet potential hires, event sponsors meet potential clients, traders meet other traders to discuss the markets with, and so on. We have even had at least one marriage so far.

By invitation only, but open to all

Our target market is niche: hedge fund managers, investors allocating money to hedge funds and their advisors/consultants/gatekeepers. If you’re not in our target market, you don’t get invited. If you are in the target market, you are always welcome. A simple policy but actually quite rare when it comes to events.

No fees

There are no membership fees and no event fees. It is all free of charge for our attendees. Seeing how many of the industry conferences have been failing with their “pay-to-attend” business models, we decided to take a different route. Our business model is solely based on sponsorship fees. We partner with a select group of service providers and luxury brands for our events. Other service providers cannot attend the events. They cannot, as with most other industry events, just buy a ticket as we sell no tickets and have a strict invitation policy. This way we can keep the quality of our attendees high.

No boring stuff

Our networking events are networking events. They’re not conferences, seminars or product pitches. Many industry conferences are crammed with so-so presentations of questionable value mixed with over-the-top sales pitches from vendors. No one really wants that. Even at those conferences that are well attended, the smart people are hanging out in the refreshment areas and at lunches and evening cocktails. They’re not really in the conference rooms. They focus on the networking. That taught us something and that is why our events have no presentations.

The Hedge Funds Club is based on a simple concept and that is exactly why it works. We know our target market because we are part of it. We keep it simple, give people what they want and we do it with a smile. First decade done, now we’re starting our next decade of connecting hedge fund managers and investors. We’ve got some great plans for the coming decade.

To all our attendees, event sponsors and friends – thank you for an amazing ten years. If you’re a hedge fund manager or an investor who have not yet experienced the Hedge Funds Club, come and join us. If you’re a service provider to the hedge fund industry who is interested in partnering with us, please get in touch. www.hedgefundsclub.com

On Thursday 18th June, the Hedge Funds Club will celebrate its ten-year anniversary with a major event in Tokyo. The event is sponsored by Japan Exchange Group, Ogier, Elian, TSI International Group, Maples Fund Services, Dealreporter, Eurex, UOB Bullion and Futures, S&P Capital IQ, Intertrust and Abarth.

Stefan Nilsson, Founder, Hedge Funds Club