SigFig is rolling out a new wealth platform for financial advisors, which aims to automate many steps in client onboarding and other processes.
The fintech firm, which works with UBS, Wells Fargo and other firms on investor-facing robo-advisors, says Citizens Bank Wealth Management is the first financial group to work with the platform, called CoPilot.
Over the past few years, advisors were "seeing [the robo platform] as … so simple in terms of signing [clients] up and onboarding," said SigFig CEO Mike Sha in interview. "They then asked, 'Can we tap into this technology, too?'"
For registered representatives — especially at large firms — their technology is "antiquated and leaves most manual work to be done by humans," Sha explained. "Built around legacy systems that are 10 to 30 years old, the advisor technology tends to be "clunky and hard to use."
SigFig's wealth platform for advisors handles front-, middle- and back-office administrative tasks, including the paperless onboarding of new clients; it also automates compliance processes such as yearly and changes to clients' risk profiles with the aim of boosting advisor productivity and firm profitability.
Time for Change
In general, "There is a shocking amount of work that is [still] being done manually. This is an industry awash in inefficient processes that can be automated," according to Sha.
