Optifi launches ‘industry-first’ approach to trust company technology and operations

What if a trust company didn't have to build its technology and operating model from scratch?

After two years of development and extensive client testing, Optifi is launching an industry-first, pre-configured technology and operating model for trust and corporate services businesses, bringing together ready-to-use workflows, integrated technology, Client Entity Management and a white-labelled client portal. The proposition gives businesses access to an integrated operating model without the cost and complexity of building it themselves.

Jersey-based Optifi was born from a question its founders, Stuart Richford, Alain Egre, Alex Steele and Cara Wright, had been asking for years: why is every trust company having to build the same technology and operating model from scratch?

The turning point came when the team stepped back and put its early Optifi concepts through a client council process to test the proposition in the market. Cara led more than 30 sessions with peers across the industry, where a clear pattern emerged; businesses had invested in the technology, but their teams were still having to swivel-chair across six or more systems to complete what should have been a simple service request. Optifi has now run more than 100 client sessions, with feedback from those conversations continuing to shape the proposition.

After two years of development, Optifi has brought together the technology, workflows, integrations, partners and operational experience needed to support a modern trust company, providing a pre-configured proposition businesses can adopt without having to build everything themselves.

Early results demonstrate the impact. In one client engagement, Optifi has delivered an 85% reduction in compliance monitoring activity and a 32% improvement in through put time, a process which used to take three days and now takes two end-to-end, with results measured against agreed outcomes.

At the heart of the proposition is a simple ambition; to govern processes end-to-end, provide a compliant foundation for automation, and codify compliance into every day actions, giving trust company teams more capacity to focus on the work that really matters, nurturing relationships, growing wealth and building legacies for their clients.

“We've spent more than 150 years between us, working in and around financial services, and we've seen the same challenges over and over again,” says Stuart Richford, CEO and co-founder of Optifi. “Trust companies are being asked to operate like technology businesses, but most didn't set out to become technology businesses. They shouldn't have to spend their time designing workflows, joining systems together and building the infrastructure they need.

“So we asked ourselves; why should they? We took our initial ideas to the market, listened to what clients told us and used that feedback to shape what we've launched today. We've brought together the technology, the workflows, the integrations, the partners and the expertise. The result is something businesses can use, rather than something they have to build.”

Pre-configured, not bespoke

The founding team has more than 150 years of combined experience across banking, wealth management, trust and corporate services, fund administration and technology transformation. Crucially, that experience is not purely technical; it includes a deep understanding of the workflows, processes and operational challenges involved in running trust and corporate services businesses.

Traditionally, these workflows and technology solutions are designed and configured around each individual business, requiring significant time, resource and specialist expertise.

Optifi has taken a different approach, pre-configuring the core technology, workflows, integrations and operating framework around the way trust and corporate services businesses operate.

The proposition incorporates pre-built workflows, Client Entity Management, intelligent automation and technology, with the ability to connect with the wider ecosystem of systems and service providers businesses already use.

It does not remove every element of implementation. Instead, Optifi provides the core elements already configured, reducing the design, change management and integration work required from the client. For SME and emerging trust companies, this is intended to make transformation more accessible, without the time, resources and specialist expertise traditionally required to build an operating model from scratch.

A client experience under your own brand

The proposition includes a white-labelled client portal, allowing firms to provide clients and other stakeholders with a digital experience under their own brand. The portal sits alongside the underlying workflows, Client Entity Management and technology, creating a connected environment rather than another standalone system to manage.

Built around outcomes

Optifi also challenges the traditional way transformation services are bought. Rather than charging simply for time or user numbers, it focuses on outcomes and measures performance against agreed improvements.

For Optifi, the ambition is not simply to provide another piece of technology, but to make hard-won experience of how financial services businesses actually operate available in a form businesses can put to work immediately.

“The whole point is that we've done the hard bit,” says Stuart. “Businesses shouldn't have to reinvent what we've already learned. They should be able to take it, make it their own and get on with doing what they do best.”

-ENDS-

Notes to editors:

For more information or to arrange interviews with Optifi, please contact Floor Ten at hello@floortenagency.com

For more information about Optifi please visit: https://optifiplatform.com