UK business consulting firm GreySpark Partners expands further in Asia by opening its third branch in Sydney.

GreySpark Partners, the UK business consultancy firm, has expanded its Asia-Pacific operations with its first Australian office in Sydney.

GreySpark Partners Australia will provide consulting services in areas such as risk management, electronic trading and market structure to institutional investors and banks in the country and across the Asia-Pacific region, it said in a statement. The office will also act as its Asia-Pacific advisory hub for over-the-counter derivatives clearing.

The Australia team will be led by Braian Szwarcberg-Poch as managing director. Szwarcberg-Poch returns from London where he helped establish and distribute Barclays' OTC client clearing offering in the UK and Europe. He is joined by Malavika Shekar as senior consultant. Shekar previously led a number of programmes in the global OTC clearing team at JP Morgan in London.

The company said that opening a Sydney office is in response to the regulatory reforms being implemented in the $600 trillion global OTC derivatives market, particularly with the introduction of the Dodd Frank Act in the US and the European Union's European Market Infrastructure Regulation, both of which are expected to have a global impact.

GreySpark was founded in London in 2009 and advises investment banks, hedge funds and asset management firms. It has over 70 consultants worldwide. Sydney is its third office in the Asia-Pacific region, the first being Hong Kong in 2011 and then Singapore in 2012.