In recognition of the need for a strong, recognizable and global identity for its Investment Entities, the OMERS Worldwide brand was created in 2008. Each investment group — OMERS Capital Markets, OMERS Private Equity, Borealis Infrastructure, Oxford Properties Group and OMERS Strategic Investments — is now included under the OMERS Worldwide brand. Operating under the OMERS Worldwide umbrella allows our Investment Entities to maintain the strong individual brands they have developed over many years, while at the same time becoming more closely aligned with OMERS and one another by name and visual identity. The shared and easily-recognized OMERS Worldwide brand will be particularly important in today's knowledge-based economy as our talented investment team focuses on unlocking value, attracting domestic and global capital, and using a direct-drive asset management approach forged with our partners around the world.
Our goal is to diversify OMERS assets on a global basis to capture investment returns from economies that move on a different cycle than the Canadian economy and to reduce the home market bias of “too many eggs in one basket” (recognizing that Canada is less than 3% of world investment markets). The long-term target is to invest 50% to 60% of the total fund outside Canada.
OMERS is making significant progress in internally, actively managing an increasing proportion of OMERS investments to enhance returns and reduce investment costs. The principal drivers are increased active management of foreign equities, foreign currency and private equity. Our goal is to have 90% of total fund assets directly managed by 2012 as compared with approximately 70% at the end of 2007.