Jeanne Baur (Suisse Tech Partners)

Jeanne Baur (Suisse Tech Partners) : Technology isn’t an end to itself, but...

The evolution in wealth management reflects the progress in medical diagnosis says Jeanne Baur, Director of Professional Services at Suisse Tech Partners. Instead of a limited source of information for diagnosis by a small circle of referrer, it is now necessary to be able to operate a wide and evolving network of specialized competence centers with constant accessibility and capacity to continuously respond to the patient - or client.

What is the state of the Swiss wealth management market?

The Swiss wealth management industry has been undergoing rapid and radical changes in both form and substance for several years. I compare advances in wealth management to those we have seen in health diagnostic: the brief has to be based on a network of medical data that combines a range of specialized skills over a broad range of medical fields with continuous and constant availability and capability to respond quickly to challenges. Wealth management is also experiencing more stringent regulatory requirements while new players and accessible technology are creating a more competitive marketplace.

“STP is driven by the will to do but not by the will to say”

How can technology increase its efficiency?

Technology isn’t an end itself. But it the power to access, secure and process the increasingly complex and exponentially growing volume of information needed to understand and control markets and their investment vehicles. The entire business chain requires efficient and flawless technological support, enabling a detailed regulatory and compliance follow up of the entire market view, financial instruments, customer assets and their "behavior" to be kept in real time. This ranges from the qualification of an investment vehicle to its impact on the performance calculation, including risk calculation, compliance survey, tax simulation, acquisition and accounting, as well as its inclusion in the valuation, which will itself be consolidated.

How is STP differentiating itself from its competitors?

Thanks to a combined experience within its executive board of more than 150 years in the wealth and asset management, STP is driven by a clear vision to implement and match the solution to needs, guaranteed by its concrete involvement in all phases. This makes STP unique in comparison to its competitors, which are mainly managed by people with objectives that are far from the problems encountered by customers. STP’s exclusive activity is the development and implementation of its portfolio management system solution, PMplus. Entirely "web-based", using recent and proven technologies, it doesn’t require local deployment which ensures a short implementation cycle. PMplus’s identification and categorization process allows it to be adapted to customers’ specific needs without further development. While this ensures complete independence, its robust scalability nevertheless allows for the interface with the main market systems, custodians, brokers and information providers ensuring a high-performance OMS. New connectors are regularly developed and made available. In line with what the market needs, we have developed it as a modular solution. This innovation allows customers to subscribe to customized functionality based on transparent pricing. It means that at any time clients can add modules to their activities and activate their operation without difficulty.