Bovill, the British financial services regulatory consultancy, is to open an office in Singapore in the next few days.

Its chief executive, Ben Blackett-Ord, is already based in Singapore and is putting together a team of compliance specialists with local knowledge and international experience. The office will open before the month is out.

Bovill Asia will help fund managers, brokers, banks, wealth managers and venture finance firms with both day-to-day compliance and regulatory projects. Building on 15 years’ experience in the UK, during which time it was called Bovill Gunn and the Bovill Group, Bovill (which now has a stand-alone name) will help clients obtain authorisation for this-and-that from the Monetary Authority of Singapore. It also wants to help organisations fall into line with the updated Financial Action Task Force recommendations of 2012 and new outsourcing and data protection laws.

The firm also wishes to attract the custom of Singaporean firms that want to market funds in Europe and the UK, a set of customers that might want help in their struggle to tackle the European Union's directives, which include the Alternative Investment Fund Managers' Directive and the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive.

The Singapore office will be the firm’s first permanent international office. It currently has offices in London and Manchester and a representative office in New York.

Blackett-Ord has commented that one of his reasons for channelling Bovill's energies towards the Singaporean market is "demand from UK-based clients for international advice." Another might be that British regulations, regulatory practices, old regulators and indeed money are inexorably and constantly radiating outwards to South Asia and the Caribbean.