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The People's Pension
The People's Pension launched in 2011 under the sponsorship of People's Partnership (then B&CE), a not-for-profit provider originally established in 1942 to...
The People's Pension
The People's Pension launched in 2011 under the sponsorship of People's Partnership (then B&CE), a not-for-profit provider originally established in 1942 to serve the construction industry. The introduction of UK auto-enrolment in 2012 positioned the master trust for rapid growth, and it now serves members from tens of thousands of employers, predominantly small and medium-sized enterprises. Patrick Heath-Lay leads People's Partnership as CEO, while Dan Mikulskis took on the CIO role to professionalize the investment function for an institution that had outgrown its industry-provider origins. Mikulskis and his team run a diversified growth mandate anchored by the fund's Blend3 default strategy, which layers private-market exposure alongside public equities and fixed income. The fund has built direct and co-investment positions in UK and global commercial real estate, including mixed-use assets, and in infrastructure across OECD markets. Real assets are co-headed by Marija Simpraga and Raymond Wright. On the credit side, The People's Pension has moved into private credit allocations that benefit from the fund's long-duration liability profile — a structural advantage few UK defined-contribution schemes can match at this scale. With no published headcount, team size is inferred from the scope of operations across investment, governance, and member services. The master trust structure means the Board of Trustees, chaired by Mark Condron, holds fiduciary responsibility separate from the sponsoring employer entity, People's Partnership. The fund is a signatory to the Principles for Responsible Investment, has received PRI recognition for responsible investment, and co-created the Asset Owner Statement on Climate Stewardship alongside other large UK pension pools. The structural differentiator is the combination of not-for-profit sponsorship with a master trust architecture that pools millions of small-balance DC accounts into a single negotiating entity. This gives The People's Pension access to private-market investments and fee schedules typically reserved for large defined-benefit schemes. The challenge — and the strategic project — is managing liquidity for a daily-dealt DC membership while locking up capital in illiquid assets at a scale that makes the effort worth doing. That tension defines the CIO's mandate more than any single allocation decision.
General information
Firm type
Multi Family Office
Year founded
2011
Location
Region
Europe
Country
United Kingdom
City
Crawley
Corporate office
Manor Royal, Crawley, West Sussex, United Kingdom
Principals
Mark Condron
Chair of the Board of Trustees
Dan Mikulskis
Chief Investment Officer of People's Partnership
Patrick Heath-Lay
CEO of People's Partnership
Marija Simpraga
Co-head of Real Assets
Raymond Wright
Co-head of Real Assets
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
Who runs investment decisions at The People's Pension?
Dan Mikulskis is Chief Investment Officer of People's Partnership, the not-for-profit sponsor of The People's Pension. He is responsible for the fund's default Blend3 strategy and the expansion into private markets. The Board of Trustees, chaired by Mark Condron, retains fiduciary oversight over the master trust.
How is The People's Pension structured — is it a single employer scheme?
It is a multi-employer defined-contribution master trust, which means it pools contributions from thousands of unaffiliated employers under a single trust structure. This is the dominant model for UK auto-enrolment and differs fundamentally from single-employer occupational schemes. The sponsor is People's Partnership, a not-for-profit entity originally rooted in the building and construction trades.
Does The People's Pension invest in private markets, and if so, how?
Yes — The People's Pension has built direct allocations to UK and global real estate, infrastructure, and private credit. Real assets are co-led by Marija Simpraga and Raymond Wright. The challenge for any DC master trust is managing daily liquidity while holding illiquid assets; the fund addresses this through its Blend3 default strategy design, which layers private-market exposure within a diversified growth framework.
How does The People's Pension approach responsible investment and climate?
The fund is a signatory to the Principles for Responsible Investment and a compliant signatory of the UK Stewardship Code. It co-created the Asset Owner Statement on Climate Stewardship, positioning itself as an active, public-facing participant in UK institutional stewardship. This reflects a governance posture unusual for a DC auto-enrolment vehicle at this scale.
What is the relationship between People's Partnership and The People's Pension?
People's Partnership is the sponsoring provider — a not-for-profit entity that designs, administers, and manages the master trust. The People's Pension is the regulated trust itself, governed by an independent Board of Trustees. The separation mirrors the architecture of other large UK master trusts but is distinguished by People's Partnership's unusual not-for-profit heritage dating to 1942.
What is the fund's known posture on co-investments alongside external GPs?
The People's Pension has indicated a preference for direct and co-investment structures in real estate and infrastructure rather than solely fund-of-funds commitments. This reflects the CIO's stated approach of leveraging the fund's scale to access institutional-quality assets on terms aligned with a long-duration, not-for-profit DC membership base. Specific co-investment partners have not been publicly enumerated.
What does CIOS Mikulskis's Blend3 default strategy actually allocate to?
Blend3 is the fund's default lifestyle accumulation strategy, layering private market assets — real estate, infrastructure, private credit — alongside traditional public equity and fixed-income beta. The precise asset allocation bands are set by the trustees and adjusted for market conditions, but the guiding principle is to capture an illiquidity premium for a membership base that does not actively trade. This makes it structurally more like a US target-date fund with alternatives than a conventional UK default tracker.
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