Break The Wheel Operating Model
Alpha Alternatives (“Alpha”) and Argo Fund Solutions, Inc. (“Argo”) have collaborated to develop the below Q&A to spotlight the fund administration industry, particularly as it applies to the operating environment associated with the administration of private capital funds. More specifically, the discussion below considers the private capital administration industry’s efforts to drive innovation and improve client service in the context of the immense increase in the demand for services resultant from the underlying expansion of the private capital market.
Question 1
Q: When selecting a fund administrator, private capital managers are increasingly looking beyond operational capabilities to understand the vision and experience behind the model. What perspective does your leadership bring to the market, and how does it translate into better service for clients?
A: Argo’s leadership team is comprised of people who have a combination of deep, private capital specific operational knowledge and direct, firsthand experience in building and operating private capital fund administration platforms. Collectively, we have built and led the world’s largest private capital administration businesses, navigated complex operating environments, and most importantly, lived through the inefficiencies and limitations of legacy models. Those experiences have shaped every element of our approach at Argo; we didn’t simply theorize a model or launch a carbon copy of what is already available, we used our experience to build a service offering from the ground up, based on the actual needs of our clients.
Argo was created under the idea that the latest turn in the evolution of the fund administration industry, with its emphasis on achieving outsized revenue growth, profit maximization at every turn and executing on M&A strategies, has created a quality gap in the core service offering currently provided in the industry at large. Disjointed systems, patchwork service models, offshore execution, and leadership teams that are increasingly disconnected from the needs and expectations of their clients have become the predominant characteristics of the industry.
We built an operating model that acts like a true partner; one that identifies and addresses the needs of our clients on a truly bespoke basis. From infrastructure to service culture, every component of Argo’s operating model has been designed to close the widening gap between merely talking about quality and actually earning a clients’ trust every day by providing a quality service offering.
At Argo, we believe that the most critical element underlying a great service offering is great people. While we recognize that is an easy thing for anyone to say, we back it up with US-based, dedicated client service teams that are all fully vested owners of Argo’s business. Our clients work with experienced professionals who have built their careers understanding the nuances of private capital operations and dedicated service teams which take full ownership of the entire process from onboarding through day-to-day service delivery. Every one of our employees has bought into a culture that is grounded in trust, precision, and accountability, which together supports an equally balanced approach to achieving corporate goals and ensuring the advancement of the careers of our people.
Question 2
Q: What do you mean by disjointed systems and how does Argo’s technology platform work?
A: Disjointed systems refer to the “spaghetti chart” which underlies the systems solutions of the private capital fund administration industry; a tangle of technical debt, comprised of decades old general ledger platforms and proprietary front-end and back-end supplemental systems, which are held together by brittle connectors and behind the scenes manual processes. Spaghetti chart technology models emanating from legacy provider accumulated technical debt are a silent drag on the industry. They slow innovation, introduce operational risk, and force client service teams to operate in functional silos and spend time on maintaining complexity instead of on delivering value.
At Argo, we are technical-debt free. As such, we have been able to take a different approach. From day one, we built our platform on a clean, unified architecture. No duct tape, no legacy patches, no tangled integrations. Every workflow and data structure has been specifically designed and married to our custom processes to work together from the start. Our purpose-built technology platform allows our client teams to shift their mindset to deliver true scalability and transparency and otherwise drive toward client alignment.
Moreover, Argo’s structural approach to establishing its technology platform has been future-proofed to be technical-debt resistant, which allows us to move faster, deliver more consistently, and respond to client needs without introducing risk downstream. In a world where precision matters, we chose a straight-through technology structure over spaghetti.
Question 3
Q: How does Argo manifest its technical debt free environment?
A: Let’s consider that question by examining the client on-boarding process, which is a resource intensive, arduous, time-consuming and back-and-forth process between the manager and the administrator. The one-time task approach deployed by legacy administrator models during client/fund onboardings – just get the data in and move on – fails to consider how a more strategic setup can better drive future alignment. Just-get-it-done approaches are not only short-sighted, but also lead to misaligned reporting, ongoing operational inefficiencies, and operating models that never quite fit.
Argo takes a fundamentally different approach. We’ve fully digitized the transformation process, using structured workflows and clearly defined milestones, from initial intake through migration and system configuration. Our onboarding process is intentionally designed for speed and precision, without compromising quality, flexibility or control. We cut the traditional onboarding timeline by up to 75%, executing in weeks instead of quarters. Argo’s approach to onboarding allows our client service teams to focus on what matters - system design, reporting strategy, and customizing the platform to fit the client’s operating environment.
At Argo, every implementation is tailored to a client’s specific operating model. We don’t force funds into pre-baked configurations; we build around how our clients want to run their business. We absorb the complexity, reduce client burden, and ensure zero disruption while maintaining full transparency throughout the process.
The result is not only a faster onboarding, but also a stronger foundation: clean data, purposeful configuration and a partner that understands onboarding isn’t a formality, it’s the blueprint for long-term success.
Question 4
Q: Collaboration is a persistent challenge across the industry. Lengthy e-mail chains, version control issues, and disjointed communication all continue to define underlying collaboration platforms, causing delays and increasing risk. How have you thought about collaboration in Argo’s operating model?
A: At Argo, collaboration is based on a well-structured and real-time set of processes which have been built into (and therefore communicate directly with) our technological infrastructure. We utilize an industry leading, secure collaboration backbone, enabling centralized access to fund data and supporting documentation, and establishing customized workflow trackers which are tailored to each client’s operating model.
But that’s just one piece of the model: we have also implemented a fully digital review process for event notice and financial statement production. This digital review process allows clients to engage directly with the output and collaborate with their client service team in real time, especially during time-sensitive periods. Argo’s clients have direct front-end access to configurable dashboards and custom reporting tools, removing the need to request static reports or wait on email-based updates.
For Argo, collaboration is not just a third-party workflow tool layered on top of a manual process and a decades old general ledger, but rather a more agile and transparent environment which is defined by continuous, real-time exchanges with clients. So, what does all that mean practically? Real-time, on the fly changes to capital call/distribution notices, booked completely throughout the entire structure, prepared and reviewed by our dedicated client service team and awaiting approval in our clients’ inbox and ready for posting in seconds, not hours or days.
Question 5
Q: Expanding on the last question - can you speak to how Argo’s approach to collaboration applies to data management and system connectivity?
A: Operating out of Excel is not just outdated, it’s dangerous. The “axiom of flexibility” inherent in the industry has created a broken norm: download a report, adjust it in Excel offline, hope that it’s complete or has gone through the appropriate review and then post it on the portal. Offline, manual schedules not only increase the error risk, but also create key person risk because critical knowledge lives in individual spreadsheets rather than in a secure, centralized system.
Argo was built to break this cycle. We eliminated the spreadsheet-to-email-to-spreadsheet loop and replaced it with real-time connectivity across the entire platform. Our general ledger, reporting engine, operational workflows, and front end are all natively integrated, so data flows automatically, accurately, and without manual intervention.
This isn’t just about speed. It’s about control, trust, and auditability. Argo’s approach to data has been developed in consideration of rigorous data governance standards at the source system and then incorporates data structuring, validation and tagging principles to allow for downstream data accuracy and consistency. No surprises. No rework. Just clean, reliable information from day one.
Clients interact directly through the front end of our platform and can track fund performance, review custom dashboards and drill into transaction-level detail using the same live data that their client service teams use internally. That alignment removes friction, eliminates uncertainty, and empowers faster, more informed decisions.
In a space that is still plagued by disconnected tools and reactive fixes, Argo’s platform delivers true system connectivity and trusted data at your fingertips.
Question 6
Q: Even with all of today’s treasury solutions and sophisticated banking portals, cash processes are one of the most manual and error-prone parts of the close cycle. How have you improved cash management and reconciliation to reduce risk and increase efficiency?
A: Cash management remains one of the most outdated processes of private capital fund administration, mostly because of a reliance on manual keying of bank transactions into the general ledger and a reconciliation process which relies on compartmentalized offshore resources which tie out bank balances weeks or even months after the fact.
At Argo, we built our cash model for control and clarity from day one. Cash activity is directly integrated with our clients’ bank platforms, processed automatically into our general ledger environment, and mapped directly to expected transactions. Our approach to managing cash activity is founded on an exception-based framework, which allows our team to focus their time on where it matters: reviewing complex activity, handling nuanced scenarios, and performing value-added oversight. We’re not wasting resources on low-value data entry or creating distinct functional teams, we are instead focusing on applying the expertise of our dedicated client service teams where it has the greatest impact.
Our standard process calls for daily booking and daily reconciliation, both of which are automatically generated by the system. That means full visibility into fund-level and investor-level cash positions every day, not just at period-end. Payables, receivables, and capital activity are created in real time, closing the loop between operations, accounting, and client reporting.
Question 7
Q: One of the fundamental promises of an outsourced solution is the administrator’s ability to bring scale and leverage to bear in the operating model, especially considering complexity (e.g., volume of investors or transactions, tiered fund structures, side letters). What is Argo’s view of scale and leverage as pertaining to the Argo operating model?
A: If you want to look behind the curtain of a third-party private capital fund administrator model, look at the processes underlying capital events. The legacy approach is a manual slog of line-by-line and entity-by-entity processes which delay delivery times, increase error rates, and turn routine tasks (i.e., last-minute changes to call or distribution amounts or adjustments to the sources and uses of an investment) into fire drill preparation and review exercises.
Argo’s event processing model is rules-based and purpose-built for private capital workflows. Whether it's capital calls, distributions, equity pickups, or inter-entity movements, our system understands the fund structure and automates the transaction flow across all relevant entities in one streamlined workflow.
Each event begins with a single top-level booking. From there, using predefined logic which has been customized to the clients’ fund design, Argo’s platform automatically generates all downstream activity, payables, receivables, journal entries, and investor allocations. There are no fragmented handoffs, no redundant data entry, and no processing delays; just one clean, continuous workflow. Argo processes the full lifecycle in a single pass, faster, cleaner, and with fewer touchpoints. This isn’t an efficiency gain, it’s a structural shift in how fund administration should be done. To the question of executing on scale and leverage….Argo’s approach brings answers like real-time solutions to data accessibility, an SLA timeline compression mindset and an environment which fosters continuous operational risk reduction.
Question 8
Q: Today’s large, publicly traded private capital firms have managed to narrow the gap of closing cycles and reporting; best in class closing and reporting processes range between T+3 and T+5. By way of contrast, the private capital fund administration industry’s standard closing and reporting cycles continue to conform to the 45-day and 60-day closing cycles defined in the funds’ LPA. How have you reimagined service delivery to create more flexibility and control for clients?
A: At Argo, our approach centers around deadlines that are defined by the client, not our processing capabilities. We believe that building operating processes around legally defined deadlines as a delivery standard is how you end up with compartmentalized client service teams, 11th-hour rushes, error-prone processes, and clients left reviewing critical materials with zero room to operate. It’s not scalable, it’s not client-centric, and it’s certainly not what private capital managers need today.
As such, we don’t work backward from deadline dates, we work forward from the actual date of the close of the period. Our standard operating processes allow for a T+10 timeline; from there, our clients define the reporting date. Closing and reporting sooner, say by T+5? Fine. Closing even sooner? No problem. Our processes are designed with the flexibility to align with the cadence of the client, not the other way around.
Argo’s model works because we run our processes daily and in real-time. Transactions are booked daily. Reconciliations are automated. Data is validated and locked as activity happens, not weeks later. Entries are booked across the structure simultaneously. The closing becomes a packaging exercise, not a fire drill.
Delivering on accelerated timelines requires active partnership with our clients. There are mutual dependencies which include data, approvals, and timely inputs on both sides. While we have built flexible operating models, the real unlock is collaboration. When both sides are aligned and accountable, that’s when speed and quality scale together.
Question 9
Q: Fund managers often express frustration with their inability to access their own data which, as a function of a third-party administrator model, resides within the walls of the administrator. How have you addressed this challenge in your model?
A: Access to data can be a bit of a hostage standoff between the producers/disseminators and the consumers. Reports are delivered in batches, oftentimes weeks after the period ends and in static formats that are already stale by the time they hit a client’s inbox. Fund managers are left chasing spreadsheets, second-guessing numbers, and building workarounds just to answer basic questions about their own portfolios.
At Argo, we built a model where clients never have to ask for their own data. They see what we see, in real time, with full context, full drill-down, and no delays. Whether it’s a fund controller reviewing general ledger entries or an investor relations team pulling investor-specific data, every stakeholder gets access that matches how they work, not a generic one-size-fits-all report.
We’ve structured our delivery around three powerful options:
Direct front-end access with full drill-down into transactions and positions, so clients can explore the data themselves without relying on back-office teams;
Custom views in both the front-end and Excel add-in, tailored by role, from CFO to Controller to Investor Relations; and
Secure Data Sharing via Snowflake, enabling direct, real-time data access within the client’s own environment, eliminating file transfers and version control issues.
To be clear, what Argo delivers is neither a data visualization overlay nor a static data portal, it’s real-time, operational connectivity where data is accurate, live, and always accessible. We believe data should be democratized, validated, and client owned. That’s why transparency isn’t a feature at Argo, it’s the foundation.
Question 10
Q: As with many task-oriented and repeatable functions, there is growing interest in AI and automation across private capital fund administrators and how it applies to their operations. How is Argo approaching AI in its operations?
A: From our vantage point, the industry’s approach to AI is similar to the approach taken with the technological innovations of the recent past (e.g., Blockchain, Robotics, Machine Learning, Big Data): in your face marketing followed by interesting thought leadership pieces without any real operational execution.
At Argo, we’re not chasing hype, we’re building infrastructure. We don’t treat AI as a trend, but rather as a strategic capability rooted in operational excellence. We also know that without a real foundation of centralized, normalized, and structured data, a clear data governance framework, sensitivity tagging, and access controls, AI becomes just another industry buzzword without any real operational impact. Our approach starts with clean, secure, and structured data, which then becomes the non-negotiable baseline for the establishment of a meaningful AI strategy.
With that in place, we’re actively building toward use cases that solve real problems, including:
Empowering clients to utilize Argo enabled AI tools to mine their own data in real time and with contextual clarity;
Automating workflows to reduce manual touchpoints and lower error rates;
Detecting anomalies that flag compliance concerns before they become exceptions; and
Shifting the focus of our client service teams from task execution to high-value, strategic work.
We’re not trying to win headlines, we’re trying to raise the bar by deploying AI capabilities that are purposeful, operationally sound, and client ready.
Closing
The industry promise of a high-touch service model supported by modern technology which then defaults to a functionalized and compartmentalized service offering, delivered by offshore resources and technical debt-laden legacy systems does not compute.
At Argo, our modern-day technology infrastructure coupled with real-time, daily processing and a culture rooted in delivering quality above all else, allows us to close the gap between pitch decks and day-to-day execution. We are an owner-operated firm that is led by professionals who are obsessed with getting quality right. Our focus on data accessibility, SLA compression, and risk reduction isn’t aspirational, it’s operational and it manifests every day in how we serve our clients, how we build solutions, and how we hold ourselves accountable.