Standard Life Aberdeen’s new chief executive has been in the top job for just over two months, but he already has grand plans about how he wants to transform the £511bn asset manager to compete with some of the world’s largest passive players.

Former Citigroup executive Stephen Bird, who took over at the helm from Keith Skeoch in September, said he wants to propel SLA into the booming exchange traded funds sector, which at the end of September had assets of more than $1.1tn in Europe alone.