Origo has launched an integration hub to allow platforms and adviser software suppliers to link to each other through a central system.
The not-for-profit fintech company says it will remove the need for companies to integrate with one another on an individual basis by allowing just one link to be set up with Origo.
At the moment the hub supports investment valuations and account opening but work is ongoing for a number of other processes.
Paul Pettitt, managing director of Origo, said “one-connection integration” would significantly reduce resource, time and cost for advisers.
He said: “In our talks with platforms and software suppliers, as well as advisers using the systems on the ground, integration between companies was cited as one of the main inhibitors to business efficiencies and expansion.
“A lack of integration or slowness to develop it means advisers have to improvise work-arounds in respect of the systems they use and platforms are faced with time, cost and resource issues in separately integrating with each new trading partner.
“Faster, easier integration can only lead to more firms integrating with direct benefits for advisers’ back-office operations and so for their clients.”
Mr Pettitt added that the development of the hub would form a “major backbone” for Origo’s work in helping the industry to deliver a pensions dashboard.
Last month Origo said a fully-functioning pensions dashboard could be ready to go live as soon as next year.
In a demonstration to pension providers and other interested parties, Origo recently revealed it had built the back-end technology for a pensions dashboard, meaning only the front-end - the part savers will use - was left to complete.
The hub has been launched today and around a dozen platforms and software providers are in the process of signing up including some “big names”.
Adviser view
Gordon Bowden, a financial adviser with Buckinghamshire-based Quainton Hills Financial Planning, said: “I think it sounds like a good idea as long as they can get enough platforms to sign up.
“I would have thought they would struggle. There are enough platforms struggling to look after their own software without getting it to integrate with Origo.”
