Three wealth-management technology providers this week unveiled partnerships aimed at registered investment advisors, adding new capabilities in model portfolios, data integration, and transition automation. The deals—Vestmark with First Trust Portfolios, NDEX Systems with Schwab Advisor Services, and Forms Logic with Orion—target operational bottlenecks that have become more pressing as RIAs expand their client rosters and custodial relationships.
Vestmark, based in Wakefield, Massachusetts, is now offering RIAs a white-labeled solution to build and manage model portfolios using First Trust strategies. Advisors can tailor these models to individual clients, while Vestmark's infrastructure handles trading, tax-aware transitions from legacy holdings, and ongoing tax management. The offering, available through the Vestmark Model Marketplace, launches with exchange-traded funds, mutual funds, and interval funds—the semiliquid closed-end vehicles that repurchase shares at set intervals rather than daily.
This partnership follows Vestmark's recent collaboration with Allspring on advisor-built model portfolios, a move that expanded its tax-aware modeling capabilities. Vestmark says its technology supports more than $2 trillion in assets, 5.5 million investor accounts, and over 72,000 advisors, and is used by six of the ten largest managed account program providers. “RIAs increasingly want access to the investment expertise of leading asset managers without giving up the flexibility to tailor portfolios around individual client needs,” said Rob Battista, executive vice president of advisory solutions at Vestmark.
Montreal-based NDEX Systems is deepening its integration with Schwab Advisor Services through two products that RIAs can license separately or together. Data Bridge ingests custodial feeds and other financial records across multiple custodians and asset types, then normalizes and reconciles the data so it can flow into a firm's existing CRM, reporting, investment accounting, and trading software. F-Engine, NDEX's wealth management platform, uses the same reconciled data for portfolio management, performance reporting, and advisor workflows, including reporting on alternative and off-book assets. Firms can also license individual F-Engine functions rather than the full platform.
NDEX already integrates with Schwab for automated daily feed file ingestion, single sign-on, client onboarding, and trading, with further integration in development. The push comes as Schwab continues to grow its custodial business with RIAs; in its most recent earnings call, CEO Rick Wurster said the company now serves more than 16,000 advisory firms. “Custodial access is only the beginning,” said Laurent Bensemana, chief executive of NDEX. “RIAs need data they can trust across the systems they use every day.”
Orion, the wealthtech platform focused on the RIA space, is embedding components of Forms Logic's Migrator software into its onboarding process for advisors moving their books of business to Orion. Migrator organizes transition data, identifies and pre-fills required paperwork, automates workflows, and tracks progress in real time. It follows a six-step sequence: advisor introduction, contract completion, data capture, workflow creation, affiliation day, and execution of the move.
The deal builds on Orion's recent efforts to accelerate onboarding and transition speed as competition for advisor talent intensifies. Forms Logic, based in Wheaton, Illinois, also sells Navigator, an onboarding platform designed to reduce not-in-good-order (NIGO) submissions that often cause time-consuming back-and-forths with custodians. “Advisor transitions are among the most operationally complex events in wealth management, often involving thousands of accounts, multiple custodians, and extensive documentation,” said Rick Burgess, chief executive of Forms Logic.
These partnerships reflect a broader trend in RIA technology: firms are seeking to streamline operations without sacrificing customization. As AI platforms vie for advisors' back-office work, established players are responding with more integrated, data-rich solutions. The moves also come as independent platforms add billions in assets via advisor team hires, making efficient transitions and robust data management critical to retaining talent.
