Financial planning software: Incumbents defending their ground

While some planners may yearn for simpler or cheaper solutions, the big financial planning software players have already asserted their market dominance.

Research conducted within Money Management’s Top 100 Dealer Group survey has revealed the extent of that dominance and suggests that while smaller players may be making more noise, it is the established companies such as IRESS that are the preferred suppliers to the major dealer groups.

The Money Management data confirmed that IRESS had emerged as the largest financial planning software supplier to dealer groups around Australia, with 22 of the top 50 dealer groups using the supplier to help run their wealth management investments, while an even higher number of dealer groups, 24 of the top 50, use the software provider for risk management.

NAB Financial Planning, Charter, and AXA Financial Planning are among the largest dealer groups that rely on IRESS’ software program, Visiplan, for their investments, while Millenium3 Financial Services, Lonsdale Financial Group, and Australian Financial Services use Xplan for investment.

Of the dealer groups using IRESS as their software provider on the investment side of the business, two use additional niche software.

Six dealer groups using other software for their investments also use IRESS’ risk software for risk investments, including the dealer group subsidiaries of National Australia Bank (NAB), Godfrey Pembroke, Apogee Financial Planning, and GWM Adviser Services.

Coin is the second largest provider of financial planning software, supplying 12 of the top 50 dealer groups, while only seven dealer groups use Coin for risk investment.

Of the 12 dealer groups that use Coin as their investment software, at least four do not use Coin for risk, opting for internal software instead.

Many dealer groups prefer using in-house investment software, with 10 dealer groups out of the top 50 taking this approach. The NAB group of wealth management dealer groups, Godfrey Pembroke, GWM, and Apogee, use their internal Adviser Central software for investments, while NAB Financial Planning only uses Adviser Central for risk.

Count Financial, Securitor, and Shadforth Financial Services are some of the other larger dealer groups that are using internal software for investments.

Midwinter Financial Services is used by 17 of the top 50 dealer groups for advice software, while Omnium and Visy’s software, Risk Researcher, are some of the niche software products in the risk technology space.

- Benjamin Levy