
Published at Thursday, April 4, 2019 11:01 AM on the Vive organization's page
From Idea to Reality
The status quo in the investment industry has been holding on for a long time. However, status quos are made to be broken at some point. At Vive are breaking the status quo by building the technology that gives everyone access to financial planning and professional investment services. A bold statement and a mission in itself.
We believe that today everything is possible. As Pablo Picasso once said: “Everything you can imagine is real." The boldness of his statement is quite obvious. But at Vive we share his bold belief. And we are working hard to make it happen. It all started when...
Alexander Brouwer — VIVE Founder — was calculating individual pension schemes. “At a previous job, I analyzed individual investment strategies for corporate pension schemes. These long-term investment strategies, that ultimately determine your future income, were not based on individual preferences but on basic assumptions about people’s preferences: everybody retires on the same age. We work for the same company our whole career. All career advancements are similar, and nobody takes a sabbatical.”, commented Alexander.
While working on this, Alexander dreamed of ways to build investment plans and strategies that exactly match individuals’ specific needs and preferences. And also, about mechanisms that can quickly incorporate plan and market developments. His reasoning was that: by informing users on the impact of these developments of their specific plan in a timely manner and by offering possibilities to counter adverse results, they will ultimately have more control over their investment journey and future pension income.
And that was not all. There still is a great gap between the level of advice given to pension funds and those given to the ultimate beneficiary. “Pension funds have consulting firms at their disposal to advise them on decision making, while the actual customer hardly receives any guidance. That did not make any sense!”, commented Alexander Brouwer.
Three applications linked together in the making
The VIVE team is developing several applications. An intelligent digital advisor (robo-advisor). This is the brains of our services. Based on people’s plans, the digital advisor creates bespoke investment strategies. The digital advisor also monitors each plan continuously. An easy-to-use investment application. A smart goal-driven investment app dedicated to the end customers. Start investing for the ultimate trip, your kids’ college tuition or supplementing your retirement plan. Or any other plan you might have. Creating an investment plan has never been easier. A multi-tenant investment platform. The investment app has its own platform. Other financial organizations can also become customers of the investment platform. The platform is accessible through the Vive application, but also through the applications of our partners. You could say that VIVE is available in the Appstore of our partners.
How does Vive's mobile app work?
Vive is your smart goal-driven investment app helping you achieve your financial objectives. Vive creates a fitting investment strategy for all your goals.
Create a goal — the ultimate trip, a retirement plan or building wealth. Vive immediately builds a suitable investment plan.
Change of plans. No problem. Give your money with a new destination. Vive updates your investment plan in seconds.
Pause. Unable to contribute this month? That happens. Hit the pause button and suspend your contributions until it’s convenient again.
Working with partners
Vive is building the digital advisor and investment platform mostly from the ground up. However, we do work together with great partners and suppliers. DeGiro is our partner for brokerage and custody. They trade and administer the portfolios of our customers. VWD provides the necessary price information which we use to calculate the value of our customers’ investment portfolios, but also use to generate guidance and advice. Amazon AWS — our platform is cloud-based and running on AWS servers. Auth0 delivers authentication software so the logging process and your data is secure. Northern Trust delivers the sustainable investment funds used for the investment portfolios. And we work with a series of asset managers such as APG or AON and other advisors.
Our mobile application is in the making and will be launched this year. You can get early access here and follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram to keep up to date with our news. Join us as we make investing easy and accessible to everyone.