American Century Investments, an asset management firm headquartered in New York, is to make Peter Brackett and Sigrid Johann the vice presidents of its recently opened European operation. Ben Williams, existing vice president of Institutional Business Development, also joins the European team, which is based in London.

The new client relationship team will target financial intermediaries and institutional investors across UK, Europe and the Middle East and will report to Michael Green, senior vice president of international.

Prior to joining American Century Investments, Peter Brackett spent three years as co-head of Global Consultant Relations at Morgan Stanley Investment Management where he was responsible for managing relationships with global consulting firms. He has over 15 years of industry experience including five years in investment consulting at Watson Wyatt.

Sigrid Johann worked most recently as business development manager at Wellington Management International in London, focusing on pension funds, private banks and family offices in German, Swiss and Austrian markets. Prior to this, she worked in Geneva and London for nearly 10 years as an institutional relationship manager at Capital International and at JP Morgan Investment Management.

American Century Investments specialises in offering clients and investors actively managed equity strategies. The London office will initially focus on delivering equity growth strategies across global growth, emerging markets and US growth equity sectors. The company will shortly launch a range of UCITS III funds in order to facilitate the marketing and sale of these strategies.

"As we continue to develop our international distribution, the appointment of the European client relationship team is an important step in providing a dedicated service to our growing non-US client base," said Michael Green, senior vice president of American Capital Investments.

American Century Investments has approximately $70 billion in assets, and has offices in New York, California, Kansas City, Missouri and London.