Robots find their voice
Ever wondered why digital assistants are so good? It’s all about Natural language processing (NLP) – the science of programming computers to process natural language. It makes robots “more human”. Some serious resources are going into this science. GPT-3 (Generative Pre-trained Transformer 3) is a language model that uses deep learning to produce human-like text. Applying over 175 billion…
Affordable advice – the Holy Grail?
According to Adviser Ratings, only 12.2 per cent of the population used an adviser in 2019, down from the year before. ASIC wants to know how Australians can find affordable, quality advice and issued Consultation Paper 332 to find out. Firstly, what is affordable advice? ASIC report 224 found on average, consumers believe initial advice…
Working remotely – the hidden benefits
The pandemic forced most advice firms into the safety of the “cloud” trying to keep their business alive. “Trying” quickly went to “thriving” and the Direxion Work From Home Survey found client relations and productivity were either unaffected or improved. Employees enjoyed the flexibility of working from home and owners could look at reducing the…
The return of Frankenstein
The burden of compliance together with the removal of conflicted selling has seen many dealerships look to tech for the efficiency needed to remain profitable. Should they develop their own tech stack or rely on an existing provider (or both)? Is it time for a new system built from scratch? Build your own “Frankenstein” The…
The real future of financial planning
The real future of financial planning Amazon’s Alexa I recently took part in an Amazon Alexa “hackathon” (a friendly “design” jamboree) that invited participants to “Invent the Next Generation of Alexa Experiences That Go Beyond Voice”. We were urged to create a skill that combines voice with rich sound, visuals, touch and motion. For those…
Open banking
New technologies for financial planning – Open banking What is open banking? Open banking allows some customers to securely share their banking data with third parties that have been accredited by Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC). These would typically be other banks who are automatically accredited and fintechs who need to apply. It is…