Event Perspectives: SimCorp Americas, Future Proof Festival, Association for Trust Organizations Annual Meeting, and More

It’s been a pleasure for members of the F2 team to see so many people across wealth and asset management in person over the summer and throughout September. By attending so many different industry events, we are able to see how many common themes emerge across all facets of wealth and asset management. Pointedly, AI is forcing firms to take the steps necessary to strengthen data quality and make changes to their operating model to advance and innovate.

Here’s a quick roundup of the places we were and our F2 perspective on some of those themes.

NASRA, Ridgeline Base Camp, Advyzon Consultant Experience, SimCorp Americas, Future Proof Festival, Data Management Summit, 3di’s Data Licensing Forum, Investment Performance Dinner, ATO Annual Meeting, TUG Fall Conference

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NASRA (National Association of State Retirement Administrators) Annual Conference

In attendance: Martin Ouellette, Bashi Paragamian, Cogan Wybranski

Implementing a new tool is only half of technological transformation. The second piece is change. The organizational change required to make the investment in technology worth it demands that leaders establish and communicate clear objectives. People are uncomfortable with change, but you didn’t implement the tool to do things the same way and get the same result. AI is speeding up the pace of change and putting more pressure on firms to get this part of the equation right. It’s essential that they maintain their focus long past the go-live date of a conversion. The real work begins after the platform is in place. 

Ridgeline Base Camp

In attendance: Brian Gallagher, Steven Mars, Bill Navarro

We help clients implement the Ridgeline platform, so it’s been interesting to closely follow its evolution over the past several years. One thing that stood out at this year’s event was a noticeable acceleration in their platform’s growth. We can clearly see they’ve listened to their customers and incorporated their feedback and needs into the implementation process. Many of the organizations they serve are eager to accelerate their adoption of cutting-edge tools like AI, but they need to ensure they’ve established a strong data foundation first. Once that foundation is in place, platforms that keep this pace, like Ridgeline, pay back the investment more quickly. That foundation work is worth confirming before implementation starts, not after.

Advyzon Consultant Experience

In attendance: Steven Mars

At Advyzon's inaugural Consultant Experience, Advyzon made the case that its all-in-one platform is ready for enterprise wealth firms, not just independent RIAs. They showed how firms can adopt the platform in modules alongside their own build strategy, use it to bring acquired firms and multi-firm structures onto one platform, and connect it to the rest of their stack through open APIs. Underneath all of it is a unified data model, which is what makes Advyzon AI's agentic capabilities possible. That holds whether advisors work inside Advyzon's native AI experience or through outside tools like Claude or ChatGPT. Our perspective is that the platform conversation has to include the operating conversation. As AI moves from answering questions to acting, firms must establish how those actions will be reviewed, governed, and supported when the platform is live. They should also evaluate implementation and ongoing service as closely as they evaluate features.

SimCorp Americas

In attendance: Brian Lollar, Glen Robertson, Jose Michaelraj, Pouneh Poutas, Zach Maupin, Cogan Wybranski

During the meeting, SimCorp debuted its new performance measurement engine, called IAP. SimCorp Americas brought together front office personnel, accounting experts, performance teams, and others from its asset manager, asset owner, and insurance firm clients and prospects. We led a session highlighting the unique capabilities of Simcorp's new performance measurement engine, IAP (Investment Analytics Platform), which will offer on-demand performance calculations. We see this tool as a game changer in the performance measurement space. It moves performance calculations from occurring in an overnight batch to in real time. Firms no longer have to predict every question in advance, and it frees an immense amount of storage because this is cloud-based. As asset owners migrate to IAP, we want to ensure that they build the business transformation that’s required around it in the right way.

For more on IAP, read XXX

Future Proof Festival

In attendance: Liz Fritz, Jaci Stanton, Jerry Robert, Michelle Borkowski, Cam Sheehan, Bryce Carter

Future Proof brought to life the staggering pace at which new AI tools that aim to support wealth managers are being developed. The fragmented landscape of vendors and solutions can lead advisors to become distracted and overwhelmed. Staying on the sidelines is not an option. We advise firms to prevent paralysis by starting at the beginning: take operational steps to solidify their data strategy. From there, you can design the Art of the Possible and choose tools that inform a deliberate AI strategy rather than experimentation.

To go deeper with our insights from Future Proof, watch The Data Layer Nobody Talks About: The Plumbing Under Your Tech Stack,

Data Management Summit

In attendance: Brian Buzzeli, Swati Gupta, Henil Satra, Bashi Paragamian

We found many of the sessions during this year’s Summit focused on how data is the essential element for moving firms to a future state. As AI forces the asset management industry to redesign the data operating model, data architecture, governance model, talent model, and definition of accountability simultaneously, firms must remember their goal of using AI. For some, that’s generating more revenue; for others, it’s increasing efficiency or reducing risk. Often, they lack the person in the middle who would connect these business goals to the engineers implementing the technology. Firms need to consider all elements of their data, including the people behind it and how the roles of Chief Data Officers are changing. There is a lot at stake for firms to get their data right, because none of today’s technology can operate effectively on fragmented data.

And a big shout-out to Brian Buzzeli, who was honored with the USA Data Management Industry Professional of the Year in the Data Management Insight Awards USA during the event this year. Congratulations!

Investment Performance Dinner

In attendance: Olga Gappasova

Participating in the Toronto investment community's big night was special. This unique event brings the entire industry together, and we held several discussions with people representing firms that span the industry on a wide range of topics affecting the industry. We’re looking forward to continuing these conversations and serving the greater Toronto investment community in its growth and technology transformation.

Association for Trust Organizations Annual Meeting

In attendance: Tim Buhler, Madison Bilodeau and Trasha Schwendener

Every trust organization is on a different journey, but they’re all wondering about the same things: how should we approach system change? Should we choose all-in-one or best-of-breed solutions? How will we support technology transformation when we don’t have the right people in place for this work? It starts with evaluating the business model, looking for key places to evolve your operating model, and specifically addressing people, processes, and then technology. Working with an outside partner has the benefit of gaining expertise that has an industry-wide lens.  

Trust User Group Fall Conference

In attendance: Tim Buhler and Craig French

For many trust companies, the question, “How far can I take my existing technology?” lives in the back of their minds. Actually, there are practical, cost-effective solutions where firms can add efficiency without a big budget. For example, they can cut down the time and effort they spend on annual account reviews by 60% by implementing an AI tool. Even while longer, more in-depth modernization of their tech stacks takes place, trusted companies can start building a better client experience incrementally to avoid being left further behind.  

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Want to talk more? Reach out to any of our experts above to set up a meeting.