Nokia Named Mercer as OCIO for US Retirement Plans

Finnish telecom company Nokia Corp. appointed Mercer Investments, part of Mercer LLC, a Marsh McLennan company, as its outsourced CIO and investment fiduciary for its Nokia of America defined benefit pension funds, defined contribution retirement plan and other-post employment benefit portfolios, totaling nearly $30 billion, a spokesperson for Nokia confirmed Tuesday to CIO.

Jeanmarie Grisi, CIO of Nokia of America Corp., will retire from the company in March 2025, according to a source. She has worked at Nokia and its predecessor firm, Alcatel-Lucent, for nearly 25 years.

According to the plan year 2023 Form 5500 for the Nokia Retirement Income Plan, the company entered into an agreement with Mercer in July to outsource the asset management of its plans to the firm. The target date for the commencement of Mercer acting as the fiduciary manager of the plan was listed as October 1.

Nokia’s U.S. pension plan had $13.864 billion in assets under management, with 90,189 participants. Per Nokia’s Form 5500, the plan had 7,492 active participants, 61,934 participants retired or separated from the company and receiving benefits, and 20,763 retired or separated participants entitled to benefits in the future.

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The Nokia Savings/401(k) Plan, with $9.082 billion in assets and 25,956 participants, was also outsourced to Mercer as the plan’s 3(38) fiduciary investment manager, as were the OPEB obligations, which had assets valued at about $737 million, according to the company’s 2023 annual report and a company source.

As corporate pension funds continue a streak of funding surpluses, having more assets than they have liabilities, more are choosing to outsource the management of their assets.

According to CIO’s 2024 Outsourced Chief Investment Officer Survey, 30% of corporate pensions outsource or plan to outsource their assets to an OCIO provider. Among the reasons to outsource, across all types of plans, lack of internal resources was the top reason, followed by making faster implementations and decisions, as well as the need to increase returns.