The founder and chief executive of fund tracker, investment firm and research house Morningstar has set out his ambitions for developing business after securing a key licence in Hong Kong.

Morningstar, the investment consultancy and fund tracker, intends to add fund analysts and attract clients for its fund-of-fund offering after winning an investment management licence in Hong Kong, reports AsianInvestor.

The publication quoted Joe Mansueto, Morningstar founder and chief executive, as saying in an interview that he wants to see a “commensurate capacity” to that in Europe and the US, but did not make specific projections of such growth. The aim would be both to transfer staff from the US and hire locally in the region, the report said.

WealthBriefingAsia in February reported that Morningstar had named a new head for its Asia-Pacific research arm in the person of Anthony Serhan, who had previously been the chief executive of Morningstar Australasia. He was appointed managing director of research strategy, Asia-Pacific for the global research group, taking up the post in April. Among other changes, Heather Brilliant, who had been chief global director of equity and corporate credit research, and Mark Roomans, who was chief operating officer of Morningstar Europe, became co-chief executive officers of Morningstar Australasia in Sydney. Brilliant and Roomans manage the business Brilliant will become the sole CEO in 2015.

The report quoted Mansueto saying that at present, out of 110 manager research analysts globally (as of March 2014), there are 30 to 40 analysts in Europe, the Middle East and Africa and around 30 in Asia Pacific.

Morningstar has been growing organically in China to its present headcount of around 900 staff, including 810 employees in Shenzhen, who concentrate on fund database compilation and software development and some 40 staff who sell into the mainland market.