The CEO of the future combined Mellon and Bank of New York sees Boston as a key location to the merged mutual fund back office firm's future. Robert P. Kelly told Boston business leaders that the firm expects to make proportionally fewer cuts in Boston than in other locations, reported the Boston Globe Friday morning.

Bank of New York purchased the back office operations of Pittsburgh-based Mellon Financial Corp. last Fall. The companies' shareholders are scheduled to vote on approving the deal at a June 24 meeting. The merger still also requires regulators' approval.

Sources at Mellon have told the MFWire.com that company leaders are expecting the two firms staffs to be merged by July 2.

The Bank of New York and Mellon Financial currently employee roughly 40,000 workers, including some 2,600 workers in the Boston area.

Company executives have said that they expect to eliminate as many as 10 percent of those jobs, primarily through attrition and not layoffs.

Kelly told attendees at the Boston College Chief Executives' Club meeting Thursday that the cuts in Boston would be materially smaller than in other areas.

"That reduction in this town is going to be way less" Kelly said, according to the paper. He added that workers in Boston, who primarily service private wealth and asset management clients, could see more business come their way as the Chinese market grows. The asset management business includes the firm's mutual fund services work.

Kelly's comments come even as other Boston-based back office firms are also cutting jobs. Earlier this week, State Street let go some 450 workers in wake of its merger with Investors Financial Services. 

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