Fintech Impact

Summary:

In this 86th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host discusses IVR with Stacey Zuniga, Vice President of Financial Services at ENACOMM. ENACOMM is a leading provider of innovative, interactive, and intelligent customer-service and assisted-service solutions. This conversation explores many possibilities for the future of voice banking and voice command. 

Episode Highlights: 

● 00:28: – What is the history of ENACOMM and what is the company doing now? 

● 02:44: – Let’s talk about some of the previous interfaces for IVR. 

● 02:57: – Zuniga describes the evolution from touch-tone to speech recognition to speech-enabled IVR. 

● 04:39: – What kind of questions are you dreaming up for Alexa to respond to? 

● 05:06: – Zuniga describes using multi-modal interactions and more complicated commands. 

● 06:49: – Pereira discusses integrated smart home systems and IVR. 

● 08:42: – AI is a cottage industry where growth is outstripping supply in terms of people. 

● 09:58: – They compare AI to the crypto industry. 

● 11:14: – They discuss how children are growing up in a world with smart systems and voice commands. 

● 12:57: – How can this technology be normalized? 

● 14:44: – How can you overcome security considerations and user objections? 

● 18:24: – Zuniga describes the possibility of a secure authentication cloud that travels with you while integrating biometric data points. 

● 22:00: – If you had one wish that would change your industry, what would it be? 

● 23:26: – What was the biggest challenge getting the company to where it is today? 

● 25:15: – What excites you most about what you’re working on? 

3 Key Points 

1. ENACOMM is currently producing cutting-edge AI-enhanced voice services and engagement services. 

2. ENACOMM sees the world with IVR as a multi-modal world. 

3. There’s huge potential for using voice services in security and authentication applications. 

Tweetable Quotes: 

● “We’re able to take that type of technology where it’s contextual, it’s dynamic, it’s personalized, it’s based on what you usually do." – Stacey Zuniga. 

● “This platform can be used to ensure security for everyone.” – Stacey Zuniga. 

● “That’s what’s exciting today, it to see this technology being adopted more quickly or more rapidly over the next 24-36 months.” – Stacey Zuniga. 

Resources Mentioned: 

●ENACOMM

● Stacey Zuniga LinkedIn 

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Summary:

In this 85th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Ramin Wright, Investment Analyst at Luge Capital. Luge Capital is a Canadian venture capital fund that focuses on early-stage fintech companies and artificial intelligence solutions applied to financial services. Ramin talks about how Luge Capital began, their investment partners, how they go about vetting potential companies for investment, and what the relationship can evolve into after the investment has been made. 

Episode Highlights: 

● 00:26: – Ramin Wright defines Luge Capital. 

● 00:51: – Ramin shares the history of how Luge Capital got started. 

● 01:49: – How did Ramin get involved with Luge Capital? 

● 02:38: – What does early-stage investment look like for Luge? 

● 02:53: – What verticals does Luge Capital invest in and what do they look for? 

● 04:35: – How do they go about vetting candidates for investment in the due-diligence stage? 

● 05:26: – What does the relationship look like with their backers once the investment has been made? 

● 06:00: – Who was their first client? 

● 07:53: – What value does open banking have? 

● 11:00: – Ramin discusses Luge Capital’s investment in Finaeo. 

● 12:08: – What does it take for a start-up to make Luge Capital interested in investing? 

● 14:29: – The world of payments needs innovation. 

● 15:46: – Ramin talks about banking for kids. 

● 17:25: – What does Luge Capital have to say about global identity? 

● 20:38: – What are the challenges of having a portable credit score that travels with us? 

● 22:23: – Why is frictionless real estate an area that is ripe for needing innovation? 

● 24:07: – Ramin and Jason discuss blockchain technology. 

● 26:16: – What would Ramin change in his business or in his industry? 

● 27:47: – What has been the biggest challenge in his business? 

● 30:21: – What is the most exciting thing Ramin Wright is working on? 

3 Key Points 

1. Luge Capital looks for a strong vision for a company with a strong team that includes entrepreneurs with a global focus, a big appetite for growth, and the ability to execute on large opportunities. 

2. Luge Capital is interested in companies that are targeting remaining frictions within the financial services industry. 

3. There are typically at least 10 people involved in a real estate transaction that need their own information to get the job done. 

Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Luge Capital is an early-stage fintech venture fund. We invest solely in the fintech vertical and across companies headquartered in Canada and the United States.” – Ramin Wright 

● “For us, early-stage, we hang out typically around the seed and A rounds of a company. So our first check into a company will range around the order of a quarter-million to $2 million.” – Ramin Wright 

● “Something that we work with that is unique about us is our backers are all large financial institutions and they all have a strong interest in working together with the companies that we invest in.” – Ramin Wright 

Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s 

● FintechImpact.co – Website

● Linkedin – Ramin Wright 

● luge.vc – Website 

● luge.vc/ideas/ – Luge Capital’s 6 Ideas for Innovation

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Summary:

In this 84th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Jamie Hale, Co-Founder and CEO at Ladder Life. Ladder Life is speeding up the often time-intensive life insurance process for customers to around 8 minutes, offering coverage from $100k to $8 million. Jamie shares exactly how Ladder Life life insurance is addressing pain points in the industry to the benefit of consumers, how they are handling underwriting, their investor distribution channel, and selling to the workplace space. 

Episode Highlights: 

● 00:13: – Jamie Hale defines Ladder Life. 

● 01:11: – What was the reason Jamie started Ladder Life? 

● 03:09: – How is Ladder Life able to approve life insurance in 8 minutes? 

● 05:38: – How hard was it to get carriers to work with them? 

● 06:29: – How are they tackling the underwriting differently? 

● 08:54: – In what way is the confirmation for policies done digitally? 

● 09:53: – How should customers go about reducing coverage? 

● 10:30: – Have they done many integrations to date? 

● 11:26: – How does their investor distribution channel work? 

● 13:02: – Jamie Hale discusses how Ladder Life sells to the workplace space. 

● 14:38: – Is Ladder Life planning to expand to any other forms of insurance? 

● 15:51: – How does Ladder ensure that they are competitive with price competition? 

● 17:17: – What would Jamie change in his business or his industry? 

● 18:16: – What has been the biggest challenge in his business? 

● 19:56: – What is the most exciting thing Jamie Hale is working on? 

3 Key Points 

1. Ladder Life does all the life insurance underwriting in the background in real-time to give an instant decision. 

2. Life insurance needs of customers aren’t static. They change over time. 

3. Ladder doesn’t currently show competitor prices. 

Tweetable Quotes: 

● “We are trying to reengineer the life insurance-buying process.” – Jamie Hale 

● “People can go to LadderLife.com, figure out what life insurance they need. Go through the application process. Get an instant decision and be done in about 8 minutes.” – Jamie Hale 

● “Ladder’s mission is that we believe we’re helping fund the resiliency of families and communities by helping close the coverage gap.” – Jamie Hale 

Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s 

● FintechImpact.co – Website 

● Linkedin –Jamie Hale 

● ladderlife.com – Website

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Summary: 

In this 83rd episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Corey Westphal, CEO at Mobile Assistant. Mobile Assistant is an app that enables financial advisors to dictate notes for transcription and later for integration with CRM software. Corey discusses the process of the user experience for Mobile Assisted customers, how Mobile Assistant manages to provide accuracy for their dictation, the various range of templates that are possible, and the feedback that Mobile Assistant has received from advisors. 

Episode Highlights: 

● 00:43: – Corey Westphal defines Mobile Assistant. 

● 02:47: – What does the user experience of the process look like? 

● 06:01: – Corey discusses compliance, CRMs, and the ability to design templates. 

● 07:58: – Has he had any conversations around templating and machine learning? 

● 09:45: – Does Mobile Assistant utilize AI? 

● 11:15: – Technology for dictation may be used to a degree but there will always be a need for the human component for incredible accuracy. 

● 12:26: – What type of turnaround time does Mobile Assistant offer? 

● 14:12: – What are the different methods of delivery? 

● 17:17: – Has there been any pushback for confidentiality and security issues? 

● 19:47: – Do clients request the actual recording itself? 

● 20:40: – What kind of feedback has Mobile Assistant been getting? 

● 26:16: – What would Corey Westphal change in his business or in his industry? 

● 29:39: – What has been the biggest challenge in his business? 

● 31:45: – What is the most exciting thing Corey Westphal is working on? 

3 Key Points 

1. Mobile Assistant doesn’t utilize any AI in their platform yet. 

2. The email delivery that they start with is done through a TLS encryption protocol so the dictation is secure and accurate. 

3. If you wait even an hour after a meeting to dictate notes, 2⁄3 of your short-term memory is gone. 

Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Mobile Assistant is designed to provide financial advisors primarily an easy, accurate way of documenting their client meetings.” – Corey Westphal 

● “Instead of just hitting the record button, speaking, and free-form dictating your notes. Now you will be able to go into ‘The Assistant’ and be able to pick a template.” – Corey Westphal 

● “We promise 8 business hours turnaround time. We operate at more like 4-5 business hours.” – Corey Westphal 

Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s ● FintechImpact.co – Website 

● Linkedin –CoreyWestphal 

● Mobileassistant.us – Website

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Summary:

In this 82nd episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Simon Boulet, Founder and CEO at Wealthica. Wealthica is an investment aggregation platform that allows you to consolidate all of your different investment accounts in one easy-to-use platform with intelligence and triggers that help you to make better actionable decisions. Learn how this company was started and the value it has to offer. 

Episode Highlights: 

● 01:25: – Simon Boulet defines Wealthica. 

● 01:53: – What was the reason Simon started Wealthica? 

● 04:39: – How did Simon start tackling the value proposition of Wealthica? 

● 06:59: – What are the feature sets that Wealthica is offering? 

● 10:55: – How does Wealthica monetize? 

● 12:25: – How does Wealthica work on the transaction side? 

● 13:46: – What is the cash drag alert? 

● 17:24: – What was the driving factor for the Google Sheets add-on? 

● 20:59: – What are Simon Boulet’s opinions on open banking? 

● 31:51: – What would Simon Boulet change in his business or in his industry? 

● 33:45: – What has been the biggest challenge in his business? 

● 35:22: – What is the most exciting thing Simon Boulet is working on? 

3 Key Points 

1. Wealthica built their own backend from scratch and can connect to financial institutions to receive data. 

2. Wealthica’s dashboard is free but they monetize in three ways: paid ad-ons, a white-label version, and selling the use of their engine to others. 

3. Financing and having remote employees have been challenges. 

Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Wealthica is a pre-dashboard for investors to see all of their investments in a single passport.” – Simon Boulet 

● “We built Wealthica from the ground up: multi-currency, multi-language, with all the Canadian subsidies.” – Simon Boulet 

● “We are really building from the investor side of things. We are trying to simplify things.” – Simon Boulet 

Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s 

● FintechImpact.co – Website

● LinkedIn –Simon Boulet 

● Wealthica.com – Website

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Summary:

In this 81st episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Aashu Virmani, Executive Vice President at Fuzzy Logix and FastINDX. Fuzzy Logix is a big data management platform that applied artificial intelligence to extremely large sets of data in a very fast and efficient way that helps businesses with a variety of tasks. Hear about how Fuzzy Logix, along with FastINDX creates custom indexes that can be screened on many different parameters that match a client’s value proposition. 

Episode Highlights:

●  00:56: – Aashu Virmani defines Fuzzy Logix.

●  04:10: – What is the specific analytic that they have accelerated? 

●  06:45: – What does FastINDX do?  

●  12:40: – Which timeframe is Aashu’s company able to shrink for clients? 

●  15:12: – For testing securities, are the other datasets they can overlay to find correlations? 

●  20:00: – Data doesn’t show a performance lag. 

●  21:18: – Aashu explains how the operations and day-to-day-maintenance works. 

●  25:37: – How does FastINDX go about producing reports and fact sheets?

●  28:39: – What would Aashu Virmani change in his business or in his industry?

●  30:06: – What has been the biggest challenge in his business?

●  31:51: – What is the most exciting thing Aashu Virmani is working on?

3 Key Points

1. Fuzzy Logix’s customers are typically in the financial world or in healthcare. 

2. FastINDX does three things well: creation ideation, reconstituting portfolios, and producing reports and fact sheets.  

3. At the very minimum, they do 11-year back tests for portfolios. 

Tweetable Quotes:

● “We found an unmet problem that wasn’t solved in the market, and that was ultra-high-performance analytics, or machine learning when the data sets become really large.” – Aashu Virmani 

● “We essentially flipped the approach and said, ‘hey, instead of moving all this data, why don’t we just move some code to the data?” – Aashu Virmani 

● “If you go to emerging markets you start to get clean data really only from 1991 onward. But when you’re talking about the big companies like SP500s etc. you can easily go back to the inception and you will have some good clean data.” – Aashu Virmani 

Resources Mentioned:

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s

● FintechImpact.co – Website 

● Aashu Virmani – Linkedin

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In this 80th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Perry Rahbar, CEO and Founder of dv01, a data management, reporting and analytics platform that brings transparency and insight to lending markets to help them become more efficient for institutional investors and safer for the world. 

Perry shares how dv01 began, their various tools including market surveillance and portfolio management options, and how the financial industry will benefit. 

Episode Highlights:

●     00:32 – Perry Rahbar defines dv01.

●     01:54: – How did Perry get started with dv01? 

●     05:36: – Where is the data being sourced?  

●     07:06: – What does dv01 offer to make financial planner’s lives easier? 

●     09:53: – Perry explains the market surveillance and portfolio management 

                          tools that are available.  

●     15:04: – Online lenders get a lot of flack for having poor performance but 

                          they are very accountable in real-time. 

●     16:53: – Perry and Jason discuss the transparency dv01 provides and the 

                          problem with basic spreadsheets. 

●     22:13: – What would Perry Rahbar change in his business or in his 

                          industry?

●     23:52: – What has been the biggest challenge for Perry in his business?

●     27:43: – What is the most exciting thing Perry Rahbar is working on?

3 Key Points

1. dv01 has loaded up the credit risk transfer universe in the Fannie Freddie world which is a $1.8 trillion market. 

2. One of the biggest growth drivers at dv01 has been what they have done in securative reporting called a loan data agent.

3. Perry wishes capital markets would have an interest in being more forward-thinking and get past the status quo mindset.  

Tweetable Quotes:

●  “dv01 is the first end-to-end data management, reporting, and analytics platform in the lending market.” – Perry Rahbar

●  “I think where we differentiate ourselves from any other vendors in the space is really that focus on low-level data and making it super accessible and web interface where people can really answer their own questions.” – Perry Rahbar

●  “We have a data surveillance off-market surveillance offering which is the whole consumer universe, all the different originators being able to access performance on that.” – Perry Rahbar

Resources Mentioned:

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s Facebook

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s LinkedIn

● FintechImpact.co – Website for Fintech Impact

● Perry Rahbar – Linkedin

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Summary:

In this 79th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Kevin Mulhern, CEO and Co-Founder of AdvisorStream, an omnichannel online management tool to help advisors to communicate and market to their clients. Kevin shares information about how AdvisorStream works and provides value to advisors, how AdvisorStream can provide targeted content, and ways to benefit from their newsletter and content from world-class publishing partners. 

Episode Highlights: 

● 00:28 – Kevin Mulhern defines AdvisorStream. 

● 02:28: – What does the tool look like and how does it work? 

● 05:23: – How does AdvisorStream differ from other media management tools? 

● 08:09: – What else does AdvisorStream push out to as an omnichannel tool? 

● 12:16: – What are the average email open rates and click-through rates in the financial services industry? 

● 14:30: – What are some of the complaints and resistance that AdvisorStream gets from advisors? 

● 15:00: – Lack of communication is the biggest reason why clients leave advisors. 

● 18:17: – We are prewired as human beings to resist change. 

● 19:02: – What type of return-on-investment can AdvisorStream offer users? 

● 22:46: – What is the on-boarding time for the advisor? 

● 23:41: – Engagement is important for getting new business from online business. 

● 26:00: – What would Kevin change in his business or in his industry? 

● 28:52: – What has been the biggest challenge for Kevin in his business? 

● 31:53: – What is the most exciting thing Kevin Mulhern is working on? 

3 Key Points 

1. For newsletters, AdvisorStream can link to related content from their supply of partners and your clients or prospects won’t be sent to a paywall. 

2. AdvisorStream creates consumption profiles on every client that an advisor has to accurately provide targeted content. 

3. Email open rates are only just over 21% for the financial services industry. The click-through rate is only 2.59% that are actually reading something. 

Tweetable Quotes: 

● “We work directly with publishers. That makes us unique, where there are no other solutions anywhere today.” – Kevin Mulhern 

● “The newsletter piece is different. Its an outbound digital channel. You control when you send it. You control what’s included. You control what your clients and prospects are going to see.” – Kevin Mulhern 

● “If your clients don’t have a great experience and the content is not really current, about three or four days current, they’re not going to share it with their networks, creating new leads.” – Kevin Mulhern 

Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira

● FintechImpact.co – Fintech Impact 

● Linkedin -Kevin Mulhern

● advisorstream.com -AdvisorStream

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Summary:

In this 78th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Dr. Angus Hervey, Co-Founder of Future Crunch. Future Crunch is a company that looks at the impact of technology on our changing world. Dr. Hervey breaks down the ways that technology as a tool, a blueprint, and a process has accelerated human evolution in areas of communication, energy, and health. 

Episode Highlights: 

● 00:43 – Dr. Angus Hervey defines Future Crunch. 

● 01:12: – What is Dr. Hervey’s educational background and how he started Future Crunch? 

● 04:57: – How does technology throw money wrenches into economics? 

● 08:51: – Dr. Hervey discusses the progress of technological changes. 

● 12:16: – How has communication been impacted by technology? 

● 17:15: – What are the major evolutions in energy? 

● 22:36: – Dr. Hervey discusses the healthcare sector technological revolutions. 

● 29:37: – What have been the technological advances in finance? 

● 31:33: – What exactly is network effect? 

● 33:50: – Smaller financial advisory firms don’t need the same amount of data as tech giants. 

● 34:34: – We are in a data economy now. 

● 38:25: – What has been the biggest challenge for Dr. Hervey in his business? 

● 40:20: – What is most exciting for Dr. Hervey? 

● 43:00: – What would Dr. Hervey change in his business or in his industry, what would it be? 

3 Key Points 

1. Dr. Angus Hervey thinks of technology in three parts: a tool, a blueprint, and a process. 

2. Humanity’s progress is due to technological innovation in three areas: how we communicate, where we get energy and how we use that energy to move around, and how we take care of ourselves. 

3. More than 2 billion people globally identify as gamers. Four of the most valuable sports tournaments in the world are digital gaming tournaments. 

Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Future Crunch is an organization that explores what’s happening on the frontiers of science and technology, and our job is to help people’s understanding out there, so they can be better prepared for what’s coming down the line.” – Dr. Angus Hervey 

● “Solar itself employs something like 250,000 people. I think coal supports 60,000 now in the United States.” – Dr. Angus Hervey 

● “If we don’t get to zero carbon by 2050...we burn.” – Angus Hervey 

Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira 

● FintechImpact.co – Website

● Angus Hervey – Linkedin 

● Future Crunch – futurecrun.ch 

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Summary:

In this 77th episode of Fintech Impact, Jason Pereira, award-winning financial planner, university lecturer, writer, and host interviews Preet Banerjee, Founder of MoneyGaps, a platform that helps advisors provide financial planning advice and quantify it for their clients. Preet shares his desire to serve more income bracket levels, how MoneyGaps operates and the benefits of the service. 

Episode Highlights: 

● 01:01: – Preet Banerjee defines MoneyGaps. 

● 02:37: – What is the history of MoneyGaps? 

● 03:57: – What did the research for MoneyGaps consist of? 

● 06:51: – Preet and Jason discuss the academic and value propositions side of financial planning. 

● 13:18: – MoneyGaps is not going to replace the sophisticated cash flow analysis of complex software. 

● 16:38: – Preet discusses product price compression over time. 

● 20:03: – MoneyGaps is looking to make financial advice available for those that have very little. 

● 24:04: – MoneyGaps allows you to be able to pre-populate a number of professionals that you would normally work with. 

● 26:40: – How does the MoneyGaps experience work for advisors working with clients? 

● 34:41: – If Preet had one wish about something he could change in the industry or in his company, what would it be? 

● 37:29: – What has been the biggest challenge that Preet’s company has had? 

● 39:08: – What makes Preet the most excited every day? 

3 Key Points 

1. Research for MoneyGaps included developing a framework for measuring the value of advice then using that to measure advice across multiple delivery channels. 

2. MoneyGaps is working to provide a robust GIS calculator for free. 

3. Preet is aiming to offer human-centric and digital-centric options for providing more financial advisement for more markets of underserved people. 

Tweetable Quotes: 

● “Not everybody wants a thick financial plan. But they don’t want nothing.” – Preet Banerjee 

● “Contemporary financial advice has evolved constantly and always will, and it had evolved to the point from securities to portfolio to wealth management and now to integrating behavioral economics.” – Preet Banerjee 

● “With the explosion in indexing and ETFs and access to information, we’ve seen pricing pressures on the product side. On the advice side, we haven’t seen as much innovation.” – Preet Banerjee 

Resources Mentioned: 

● Facebook – Jason Pereira’s 

● LinkedIn – Jason Pereira’s 

● FintechImpact.co – Website 

● Preet Banerjee – Linkedin

●preetbanerjee.com 

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