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Pitcairn's Advised Assets Surpass $9 Billion After Acquisition

Tom Burroughes Group Editor January 31, 2025

Pitcairn's Advised Assets Surpass $9 Billion After Acquisition

For this MFO, the deal adds to capabilities in areas such as alternative investment, an increasingly significant area of wealth management.

Pitcairn, a US multi-family office, has bought Baltimore-based Brightside Partners, an RIA serving ultra-HNW clients and overseeing about $2.5 billion in client money, for an undisclosed sum.

With Brightside's network of more than 100 asset managers and research partners across venture capital, private equity, private credit, and real estate asset classes, the transaction will add to Pitcairn’s alternative investments platform. Alternative investment is continuing to be a growing area for wealth management, as shown by articles such as this one.

As a result of the acquisition, Pitcairn now oversees more than $9 billion of advised assets. 

Closing this transaction coincides with the establishment of Pitcairn Wealth Advisors LLC, a new RIA entity under the Pitcairn corporate umbrella designed to complement the firm’s trust company and bolster its Shared Single-Family Office™ model serving multi-generational families of wealth.

“The core principle of Pitcairn’s acquisition of Brightside and the creation of our new RIA is to provide our clients with access to increased investment options and a modern regulatory structure that reflects the growth of our firm. This move represents the latest stage of our evolution as we look to lay the groundwork for the next 100 years,” Pitcairn president and CEO Andrew Busser said in a statement.  

The Brightside team of five professionals includes three partners: Pace Kessenich, Ryan Pollard, and Justin Bakewell, all of whom will join Pitcairn’s strategic leadership council.

Moving forward, Pitcairn Wealth Advisors will operate as a sister firm to Pitcairn Trust Company under the umbrella of Pitcairn Financial Group.

Pitcairn – headquartered in suburban Philadelphia with teams in New York, Baltimore, suburban Washington, DC, and Florida – has a history  dating back to 1923. The firm announced a leadership change in September 2023, following which FWR conducted an interview with Busser.

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