The Orion FUSE conference is hitting its stride as a driver of technology innovation. From startups to established technology firms, attendance at FUSE to show off integrations is becoming a way to gain attention from the advisor community and gain traction within the advisor technology ecosystem.
In its fourth iteration, FUSE has grown tremendously from a handful of developers looking to build integrations through an open-source approach on GitHub to an online platform to host code for other developers, to now supporting the larger purpose of making Orion a bigger platform for integration with applications that advisors use, such as CRM, financial planning, client portals, PFM tools and more.
According to Orion CEO Eric Clarke, FUSE came about from his many conversations with integration partners over the years and formalized into an actual live event to foster collaboration and relationships.
"Developers are not answering the phones when advisors call with issues regarding their technology and integrations," Clarke noted. "The best outcomes happen when the people who are actually engineering this great technology know each other and can quickly and easily reach out to solve these issues and maintain a healthy dialogue.'"
This year, FUSE attracted over 100 developers, product managers and technology executives uniquely gathered in a large ski house in Park City, Utah (some stayed at the luxurious Hotel Park City nearby). The main event is the annual FUSE "hackathon," where attendees spend 72 hours coding to the Orion API to bring efficiencies, innovations and new ideas so that advisors and their clients can make the most of their technology investments.
The hackathon is not only a collaborative way to drive innovation for advisors, it is also a competition. To encourage that innovation, FUSE features 16 awards that range from the best use of the Orion API to the best "True Hackathon Development."
Industry influencer Michael Kitces kicked off the competition with remarks on technology innovation in general.
