eMoney's Susan McKenna seals the CEO deal

Orion Advisor Solutions and Apex Advisor Solutions inked a deal to roll out fully digital account opening tools to independent advisors and their clients. 

Officials said Orion's new automated account solution will rely on Apex's digital application programming interface suite and aims to add efficiency to account opening and ongoing client relationship management, so that advisors have speed, and flexibility to accelerate new business growth.

Eric Clarke, founder and CEO of Orion Advisor Solutions, said the partnership is an important one for Orion, because the "time consuming and cumbersome" process of paper-based onboarding strips independent advisors of the ability to compete with larger institutions that can handle small accounts at scale.

"With our Apex integration and automated account workflow, advisors are now equipped with the resources to better service investors with smaller accounts and simple financial planning needs," Clarke said. "We are excited to enable investors to create a personalized financial plan, open an account, and fund it with or without advisor involvement through Apex's seamless offering."

Apex Fintech Solutions CEO Bill Capuzzi said the integration is a game-changer for advisors who want to scale their businesses while also delivering a personalized experience to their clients.

"We're excited to bring this solution to market with Orion and look forward to helping independent advisors expand their reach to provide critical financial planning and ongoing advice to even more investors," he said.

Executives said the new offerings give advisors and their clients access to a simple financial planning tool and the ability to open and fund accounts with Apex directly from Orion's client portal. 

Advisors can send a link to the client or prospect, and within minutes, they're guided through a fully digital onboarding and financial planning workflow. A self-guided prospect or client can complete the onboarding steps solo, or an advisor can conduct the initial data entry and pass along the financial plan to their client for final sign-off. 

The integration between Orion and Apex also streamlines document management to help advisors and their clients share, sign and store paperwork.

"Not having to walk a prospect through an antiquated onboarding process of mailing documents and waiting for signatures is a huge advantage," George Gay, CEO of First Affirmative Financial Network, said in a statement. "The powerful pairing of Orion's advisor technology and Apex's digital-first custody will allow me to convert prospects at scale, broaden my client base and gain a competitive advantage."

Dynasty Financial Partners has entered an agreement with Pontera that will help RIAs in the network securely manage clients' held away accounts.

Founded in 2012 and formerly known as FeeX before a February rebrand and three recent rounds of funding that raised $80 million, Pontera is a New York-based firm offering tools that empower advisors to trade and rebalance clients' 401(k)s, 403(b)s, 457s, variable annuities, 529s and HSAs with a complete view of all of their clients' investments.

Dynasty, which is poised to go public in an IPO, will leverage Pontera tools that allow wealth managers to run performance reporting, portfolio analytics and trade surveillance, giving advisors the power to provide clients with the same level of service on held-away accounts as custodied accounts.

Pontera Chief Business Officer David Goldman previously told Financial Planning that demand from clients to have their advisors manage retirement planning is growing. A 2021 JPMorgan survey found that 62% of individuals wish they could completely hand over retirement planning to an expert, up from 55% in 2016.

"At Pontera, our mission is to be a bridge to a better retirement for investors everywhere by allowing them to get the management they want and need in their held away accounts," Goldman said in a statement, adding that the benefit of professional investment management to clients can be big. Officials said professionally managed accounts can generate more than 3% in additional value per year, net of fees, and potentially more during times of volatility like the first half of 2022. 

"We are humbled and excited to partner with Dynasty, who we view as a pioneer and leader in the independent wealth management space, in pursuit of our goal," Goldman said.

Dynasty CEO Shirl Penney said that managing employer sponsored retirement accounts is critical to delivering a comprehensive service to clients. 

"We are thrilled to have found a provider that can deliver the capability in a scalable, secure and compliant manner," Penny said. 

Going forward, Dynasty will handle the operational elements of Pontera's services for firms within its network, including billing and performance reporting integration.

The robo-advisory and customer engagement software developer is adding a pair of new faces to its leadership team.

The San Francisco-based fintech announced the appointment of Amanda LaFerriere as chief product officer and Clifford Schoeman as director of digital wealth products. 

Officials said the additions enhance "the strength of an already customer-centric leadership team, with a depth of previous experience from such industry leaders as Amazon, Docusign and Visa."

"I'm thrilled to welcome Amanda and Cliff to our team as we continue to deliver and grow our digital wealth management, customer needs discovery and remote collaboration solutions within the financial services industry," SigFig CEO and co-founder Mike Sha said in a statement. "We believe that innovation happens when we bring people together from different disciplines, and I am confident that Amanda and Cliff's depth and breadth of experience in product design, development and execution will add tremendous value to our financial institution clients."

LaFerriere specializes in the intersection of financial products, design and customer experience. Prior to joining SigFig, she spent the last four years as Head of Product at Kansas City-based fintech firm C2FO where she was responsible for driving product vision, strategy and roadmap. LaFerriere also recently won the 2022 Corporate Woman of Achievement Award from the National Association of Women Business Owners in Chicago. 

"As the financial service industry continues its digital transformation, I'm excited to join the incredibly talented team at SigFig to help bankers and advisors meet the full spectrum of their customers' financial planning needs," LaFerriere said in a statement. 

Schoeman has spent the last decade building digital wealth solutions for multi-billion dollar firms. Most recently as head of the London headquartered software developer Intelliflo, he managed product, strategy and operational functions providing wealth technology, trading and investment management tools to advisors. He also played an integral role in the development and growth of Jemstep, a robo-advisor tool acquired by Invesco and now part of the Intelliflo ecosystem.

"Throughout my career, my passion for delivering digital wealth products and solutions that help clients has continued to grow," Schoeman said in a statement. "I am delighted to join the SigFig team to allow our partners to improve their digital and in-person collaboration with their customers."