Family Offices Require Integrated Technology Partners To Effectively Manage Client Data

CHICAGO, March 18, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Envestnet, Inc. (NYSE: ENV), a leading provider of integrated wealth management technology and services to investment advisors and wealth managers, has released a white paper discussing the obstacles that single and multi-family offices face when attempting to collect and report comprehensive financial information for their clients.

The publication, "New Paradigm for Family Offices: Turning Data Into Intelligence," is the second in a series of white papers focusing on how the integration and aggregation of investment data can greatly enhance the level of advice and service offered by non-registered investment advisors. Single and multi-family offices, as well as 501(c)3 investment advisory organizations and community foundations, are exempt from regulations associated with the Investment Adviser Act of 1940, but they have many of the same needs as RIAs and broker-dealers.

"Family offices and other non-registered investment advisors have not leveraged the full suite of available technology that their registered counterparts use in the normal course of their businesses," said James Lumberg, Co-Founder and Executive Vice President, Envestnet. "Our white paper shows that by partnering with providers of integrated, cloud-based platforms, family offices can become empowered to develop more cohesive and thoughtful wealth management strategies for the families who depend on them."

Despite the growth in family offices as a result of the increase in global wealth over the past 20 years, these organizations often have limited capabilities for investment data collection and reporting. Many affluent families have holdings spread across a wide variety of asset classes, which makes it challenging for family offices to put together reliable, consistent and up-to-date snapshots of their clients' financial holdings.

Family offices need to integrate data regarding public and private family holdings into a single report that can be presented in ways that serve all family members and the financial professionals who work with them. However, family offices and advisors have historically found it difficult to source this service because technology solutions are not an essential part of their business, and technology upgrades can be expensive. Family offices have made due with cobbled-together solutions, utilizing a smattering of portfolio management platforms, back-office functionalities and performance reporting software, and using little more than an Excel spreadsheet for recordkeeping.

The white paper demonstrates how family offices can achieve scale, efficiency and more meaningful client relationships with the help of outsourced technology solutions. Integrated cloud-based platform providers can partner with family offices to gather and compile data, build customizable reports, train professionals and make families' information accessible from any location.  

"We believe that outsourced technology providers are the most cost-effective and sustainable option for family offices to obtain the integrated reporting capabilities they need to present families with comprehensive views of their wealth," said Pamela Fennell Jacobs, Principal, PFJ Consulting LLC, who serves as a consultant to Envestnet and co-wrote the white paper with Mr. Lumberg. "Delivering timely data to families within customized reports they can easily share with all of their financial professionals will enable family offices to join RIAs and broker-dealers in benefiting from the new paradigm of wealth management."

To access this white paper, please visit www.envestnet.com/library/whitepapers.

ABOUT ENVESTNET (NYSE: ENV)
Envestnet, Inc. (NYSE: ENV) is a leading provider of unified wealth management technology and services to investment advisors. Our open-architecture platforms unify and fortify the wealth management process, delivering unparalleled flexibility, accuracy, performance and value. Envestnet solutions enable the transformation of wealth management into a transparent, independent, objective and fully-aligned standard of care, and empower advisors to deliver better results.

Envestnet's Advisor Suite^® software empowers financial advisors to better manage client outcomes and strengthen their practice. Envestnet provides institutional-quality research and advanced portfolio solutions through our Portfolio Management Consultants group, Envestnet | PMC^®. Envestnet | Tamarac provides leading rebalancing, reporting and practice management software.

For more information on Envestnet, please visit www.envestnet.com.

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SOURCE Envestnet, Inc.