A small cap separately-managed accounts manager is about to enter the mutual fund business, too. Joe Frohna, founding principal and PM, confirmed that Milwaukee-based 1492 Capital Management has been fielding requests for a mutual fund offering ever since entering the SMA business.

MFWire.com reported last week that 1492 plans to launch its 1492 Small Cap Value Fund and its 1492 Small Cap Growth Fund in early 2012, with the help of Cohen Fund Audit Services, Huntington Asset Services (and Huntington National Bank) and Unified Financial Securities [see MFWire.com, 12/21/2011].

"The actual discussion of how we're going to do it started in the early part of 2011," Frohna told MFWire.com.

To get the new fund out there, 1492 is working with firms that it already has SMA relationships with, and they plan to distribute through the mutual fund supermarkets.

"There are 12 to 13 different platforms we are working to get selling agreements with, such as Schwab, Fidelity and TD Ameritrade," said Nancy Frohna, chief operating officer and research analyst at 1492.

As for Huntingon, Nancy Frohna noted that 1492 already teamed up with the bank in the first quarter.

"It was an easy decision for us," Nancy Frohna said. "We had started working with them on our collective trust product, which launched in the first quarter of 2011."

Joe Frohna and Tim Stracka, founding principal and director of institutional sales, launched 1492 three years ago. As of December 31, 2010, they had discretion over $75.8 million of client assets. 

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