Fourth Line acquires artificial intelligence assets from TIQK

Fourth Line has purchased the core intellectual property (IP) of defunct competitor TIQK Pty Ltd, including artificial intelligence (AI) and natural language processing (NLP) technologies.

The acquired assets include a full-stack technology platform incorporating a suite of micro-application software specific to advice assurance, as well as custom NLP and AI code, AI integration tools, rules-based algorithms, and related IP.

Fourth Line’s Executive Chairman, David Travers, said the acquisition comprised the first milestone on the firm’s Advanced Technology Roadmap, and would fast-track its goal of delivering fully-automated advice assurance.

“This was a step-change opportunity that couldn’t be ignored”, said Travers.

“It essentially means that a faster and better version of Fourth Line will be faster and cheaper to develop”.

Fourth Line’s CEO, Joel Ronchi, said that the TIQK tech also delivered key building blocks for the firm’s next-gen product, with improved automation meaning more rapid disruption of the highly fragmented advice assurance market.

“Fourth Line is a technological consolidator of what’s largely a cottage industry staffed by small consultants, in-house compliance officers and sometimes, fellow financial advisers.

“Our first-generation product was sufficiently automated to attract around 12% of Australian advisers to our hybrid “bionic” advice service.

“This acquisition will expedite the development of a second-generation product offering a turn-key digital compliance function at a fraction of current compliance costs, and which is exponentially faster and more accurate than any human equivalent”, Ronchi said.

The acquired technologies will be incorporated into the next evolution of Fourth Line’s ‘outsourced compliance brain’, along with other advances in generative AI and machine learning technologies.

Their integration will be overseen by former Fourth Line CEO Travers, whose recent promotion to Executive Chairman came with responsibility to implement the scale-up’s Advanced Technology Roadmap.

“In the short term, integration of the TIQK tech will allow Fourth Line to classify, review and analyse advice more rapidly. It will also help identify exceptions, including technical and systemic advice risks, with more confidence”, said Travers.

“It’ll also help diversify the revenue model for our first-generation product, by laying the technical groundwork for a SaaS (subscription) service for high-volume clients”.

Travers will work in close collaboration with Professor Dan Hunter PhD, Fourth Line’s co-CTO and generative AI expert.

Professor Hunter is the Executive Dean of the law school at King’s College London, has extensive experience in technology startups, and is a highly published author in the fields of technology and law. He holds a PhD from Cambridge University in Cognitive Science & Legal Reasoning, a Master of Laws in AI & Law from Melbourne University, and degrees in both Computer Science and Law from Monash University.

——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

Founded in 2019, Fourth Line helps AFS licensees cut costs and improve the quality of financial advice. The firm’s clients include large dealer groups like Diverger and Sequoia, as well as self-licensed practices such as Pitcher Partners and Strategem.

The Fourth Line risk management tool uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to automate and expedite any advice file review which would normally be conducted by human auditors, paraplanners or peers. It slashes reviewer workloads while simultaneously improving the consistency and rigour of compliance processes.

With unrivalled algorithmic intelligence, Fourth Line incorporates all legislation, regulations, as well as the outcomes from over 800 AFCA (FOS) reviews, 84 ASIC EUs and all relevant ASIC Regulatory Guides and Review Reports.

Though currently focussed on the financial advice application, future versions of Fourth Line’s RegTech solution will be adaptable to adjacent verticals in Australian and offshore markets.

For information email: info@fourth-line.com.au