Cloud-Based Infrastructure for Scalable Financial Services: A Case for Agile Wealth Management

Abstract

Information and communication technology have changed how financial service firms conduct their resources and business activities, thus allowing them to create scalable business models without growing operational costs. Commercializing those efficiencies to help investors is the next logical step for this digital transformation. While access to financial advice is increasing with greater availability of cost-efficient technology, gaining access to skilled resources and trading capabilities is becoming increasingly more complicated. This paper examines how a technology and infrastructure tenders earliest aspects of an agile wealth management service. It helps create a unique wealth service that focuses on real relationships—built on shared interests and values with business advisors who are committed to delivering the best possible results for clients, and to operate by embracing generations of academic research into investor behavior and its impact on financial returns. As such, this paper commences with outlining two different views of the fintech impetus before focusing on the technology underpinning a cloud-based business infrastructure and the available wealth management tools. The balance of the paper concludes by reviewing three possible approaches to implementing a fully integrated agile wealth management practice—business inertia, business innovation, and business disruption—and the roles of changing client investor behavior and attitudes along the change management continuum.