SSgA Names Product Development Head

State Street Global Advisors, the world’s No. 2 ETF company, and the sponsor of the SPDR family of ETFs, named Scott Ebner to the newly created post of managing director and global head of ETF product development.

Ebner joins

State Street

from NYSE Euronext, where he oversaw the listing and trading of ETFs, warrants, certificates, structured notes and other exchange-traded products.

In his new role, Ebner will head product development and focus on expanding

State Street

’s share of the growing global ETF business. Boston-based SSgA had total assets under management of $217.96 billion as of yesterday, while the world's-biggest ETF firm iShares had $412.88 billion, according to data compiled by IndexUniverse.com.

“The ETF industry is currently a $1.2 trillion market globally, and despite its tremendous growth over the past 17 years, additional product innovation and education are critical to unlocking the market’s full potential,” Ebner said in a press release.

Retail Growth

When he spoke with IndexUniverse.com in 2007, Ebner said that while ETFs were well known among institutional investors, retail investors and the financial advisers who serve them were likely to be an important area of future growth.

“There's still a lot of room to go, and there's a lot of investors who could come to understand and know ETFs and find that, in many cases, ETFs are their best choice for reaching their investment goals,” Ebner said in the interview.