The prize, awarded annually by the Institute for Quantitative Research in Finance (“The Q-Group”), recognizes the originality of ideas and concepts presented; usefulness and timeliness of the results; and comprehensibility of both verbal and written presentations. Founded in 1966, The Q-Group is a global organization that brings together scholars, investment specialists and other professionals to advance the practice of global investment management.

The Q-Group established this competition in 1980, to honor Roger F. Murray, an economist who taught at Columbia Business School and frequently advised members of Congress and business leaders during the 1950′s and 60′s. Murray, who died in 1998, created the concept of tax-advantaged individual retirement accounts, among other policy innovations.

Mr. Kritzman founded Windham Capital in 1988 to research and provide innovative risk-based asset management solutions to sophisticated investors. The firm’s unique investment management approach, Windham Risk Regime Investing^TM, is based on Mr. Kritzman’s research into market fragility and financial turbulence, and uses dynamic asset allocation to manage through changing market conditions.

In addition to his position at Windham Capital Management, Mark Kritzman teaches a graduate finance course at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is both a founding partner and board member of State Street Associates, and industry-leading investment research think tank. Mr. Kritzman has also served on several corporate and non-profit boards and is a member of several advisory and editorial boards. He has won numerous other prestigious finance awards, including the Graham and Dodd Award and the Bernstein-Fabozzi/Jacobs-Levy Award.

About Windham Capital Management

Boston-based Windham Capital Management is an independent asset management firm, focused on risk-based investment solutions. Founded in 1988 as an SEC-registered investment advisor, Windham is widely known for its pioneering research and its impact on the way institutional investors manage assets. Windham provides investment management for institutional investors, intermediaries and private clients. Armed with innovative research and proprietary risk management, Windham creates and manages portfolios designed to increase the probability of investment success in both calm and turbulent markets.  Key inputs to this process are Windham’s proprietary risk measures, which reflect financial market sensitivity to changes in levels of market turbulence and seek to provide an early warning signal to fragile markets.  For more information, please visit www.windhamcapital.com.

BOSTON, MA (March 20, 2013) – Windham Capital Management has received the “Emerging Manager of the Year” Award from Money Management Intelligence at MMI’s 12^th Annual Public Pension Fund Awards for Excellence.

The award recognizes firms with $3 billion in assets under management or less which have made significant strides in delivering “return-enhancing solutions” to public fund investors and have increased their retirement fund client assets under management over the past year.  Owned by Institutional Investor, MMI is an exclusive daily information service focused on institutional investment management.

In making the award, MMI cited Windham’s Risk Regime Investing™ strategy, “which is based on the firm’s long-standing research into systemic risk and financial turbulence.”  The commendation noted that recent mandates from the Maine Public Employees Retirement System and the Arizona State Retirement System pushed Windham’s asset past the $1 billion mark.

“We’re honored to be named this year’s Emerging Manager by Money Management Intelligence and thank our clients for their support,” said Mark Kritzman, CEO of Windham Capital. “We developed our Risk Regime Investing approach to offer clients a proactive, innovative and ultimately more effective way of managing risk.  As the global market risk environment continues to change, investors can look to Windham to help dampen downside risk and capture upside opportunities.”

The award winners were announced on March 13, 2013 at a gala ceremony in Huntington Beach, California.

About Risk Regime Investing

Risk Regime Investing is a globally diversified multi-asset class approach that dynamically adjusts portfolio allocations based on the prevailing market risk environment. Risk Regime Investing uses two proprietary risk measures to identify distinct market environments (“risk regimes”) and recognize shifts from one to another. The first, systemic risk, gauges the extent to which markets are moving together and therefore more – or less – resilient to shocks. The second, financial turbulence, measures unusual relationships between asset class prices and shows extreme price movements. Windham constructs a multi-asset class portfolio designed to deliver the best risk/reward tradeoff for the prevailing risk regime.

About Windham Capital Management

Boston-based Windham Capital Management was founded in 1988 as an SEC-registered investment advisor. Windham is widely known for its pioneering research and its impact on the way institutional investors manage assets. Windham provides investment management for institutional investors, intermediaries and private clients. Armed with innovative research and proprietary risk management, Windham creates and manages portfolios to increase the probability of investment success in both calm and turbulent markets.  Key inputs to this process are Windham’s proprietary risk measures, which reflect market sensitivity to changes in levels of financial turbulence and seek to provide an early warning signal to fragile markets.  For more information, please visit www.windhamcapital.com.

“We are honored to be among the three nominees for this award,” said Mark Kritzman, CEO of Windham Capital. “Windham launched its proprietary Risk Regime Investing™ strategy in 2009 during a time of great volatility following the global financial crisis. Risk Regime Investing™ is a forward-looking approach that provides additional diversification across an investment program through distinctive opportunities to capture excess returns, and a greater ability to protect against downside risk.”

“I believe their approach may offer a stabilizer in declining markets, dampening the downside risk and a performance enhancer in resilient markets, with the ability to capture upside opportunities,” said Andrew Sawyer, chief investment officer of MainePERS, one of Windham’s public fund clients.

Award winners will be announced on March 13, 2013 at a gala ceremony in Huntington Beach, California. Click here for a link to the Money Management Intelligence article on this year’s “Emerging Manager” nominees.

About Risk Regime Investing^TM

Risk Regime Investing™ is a globally diversified multi-asset class approach that dynamically adjusts portfolio allocations based on the prevailing market risk environment. Risk Regime Investing uses two proprietary risk measures to identify distinct market environments (“risk regimes”) and recognize shifts from one to another. The first, systemic risk, gauges the extent to which markets are moving together and therefore more – or less – resilient to shocks. The second, financial turbulence, measures unusual relationships between asset class prices and shows extreme price movements. Windham constructs a multi-asset class portfolio designed to deliver the best risk/reward tradeoff for the prevailing risk regime.

About Windham Capital Management

Boston-based Windham Capital Management was founded in 1988 as an SEC-registered investment advisor. Windham is widely known for its pioneering research and its impact on the way institutional investors manage assets. Windham provides investment management for institutional investors, intermediaries and private clients. Armed with innovative research and proprietary risk management, Windham creates and manages portfolios to increase the probability of investment success in both calm and turbulent markets.  Key inputs to this process are Windham’s proprietary risk measures, which reflect financial market sensitivity to changes in levels of market turbulence and seek to provide an early warning signal to fragile markets.  For more information, please visit www.windhamcapital.com.

“With the interconnectedness of markets and asset classes, institutional investors require innovative approaches to positioning portfolios in rapidly changing risk environments if they are to meet their liquidity and funding challenges in the decades ahead,” said Kritzman in his presentation. “Our research into systemic risk provides useful insights into the relationship between fragile market conditions and the onset of periods of financial turbulence in which many investment strategies experience significantly lower returns to risk.”

In his presentation, Kritzman cited research that shows systemic risk tends to rise prior to significant market declines and can be a leading indicator of financial turbulence. He said Windham has defined a series of Risk Regimes, or states of risk, based on its proprietary measures of financial turbulence and systemic risk:

– Financial turbulence measures the statistical unusualness of a set of returns given their historic pattern of behavior. Once they hit, periods of turbulence tend to persist, he noted.

– Implied systemic risk measures the extent to which markets are unified or tightly coupled. When markets are more tightly coupled, negative shocks propagate more quickly and broadly than when markets are more loosely linked.

In response to changes in the risk environment, Windham dynamically adjusts portfolio allocations for the appropriate Risk Regime.

“Risk Regime Investing(TM) seeks to provide additional diversification across an investment program through distinctive opportunities to capture excess returns and offer greater protection against downside risk,” said Kritzman. For select institutional investors, Windham acts as strategic partner providing risk management insight based on its proprietary research, he said.

About Windham Capital Management

Boston-based Windham Capital Management was founded in 1988 as an SEC-registered investment advisor. Windham is widely known for its pioneering research and its impact on the way institutional investors manage assets. Windham provides investment management for institutional investors, intermediaries and private clients. Armed with innovative research and proprietary risk management, Windham creates and manages portfolios and single-strategies to increase the probability of investment success in both calm and turbulent markets. Key inputs to this process are Windham’s proprietary risk measures, which reflect financial market sensitivity to changes in levels of market turbulence and seek to provide an early warning signal to fragile markets. For more information, please visit www.windhamcapital.com.

Mark Kritzman, Chief Executive Officer of Windham Capital Management, said: “We’re very pleased to have this opportunity to work with MainePERS.  Risk Regime Investing

is a strong fit within the overall investment approach adopted by MainePERS.  Our approach seeks to provide additional diversification across an investment program through distinctive opportunities to capture excess returns and offer greater protection against downside risk.  As part of this mandate, Windham will act as a strategic partner providing risk management insight based on proprietary research.”

Andrew Sawyer, Chief Investment Officer of MainePERS, said:  “We selected Windham because their strategy complements our existing investment approach and offers our team a unique view on the global risk environment.  Windham is known as an early pioneer and thought leader in the field of risk-based investing, and we are looking forward to working with them to better inform how we manage the total fund.”

Risk Regime Investing™ uses proprietary methods to monitor the financial markets’ sensitivity to changes in levels of market turbulence and systemic risk.  These measurements seek to provide an early warning signal when markets turn fragile and are key inputs to the firm’s risk measurement, portfolio construction and implementation process.  This allows Windham to dynamically adjust portfolio allocations based on prevailing risk conditions.

About Windham Capital Management

Boston-based Windham Capital Management was founded in 1988 as an SEC-registered investment advisor. Windham is widely known for its pioneering research and its impact on the way institutional investors manage assets. Windham provides investment management for institutional investors, intermediaries and private clients. Armed with innovative research and proprietary risk management, Windham creates and manages portfolios and single-strategies to increase the probability of investment success in both calm and turbulent markets.  Key inputs to this process are Windham’s proprietary risk measures, which reflect financial market sensitivity to changes in levels of market turbulence and seek to provide an early warning signal to fragile markets.  For more information, please visit www.windhamcapital.com.