One of the successful firms in this news service's recent Swiss external asset managers awards programme, Wecan Group, explains why it thinks it reached the level to win such accolades and how it intends to push forward.

We recently talked to Anthony Lamy, chief revenue officer and partner at Wecan Group, about its award-winning success in our Swiss external asset manager awards programme.

What sets you apart from your peers this year and why?
Wecan Comply was initiated with and for the actors of the financial industry. The administrative burden created by the regulatory requirements has been a hot topic in the industry for years now. Everyone is complaining about it but not much has been done to truly address the problem. Tackling this is at the heart of our mission, we want to truly simplify the compliance process for banks, independent asset managers, and trustees. What sets us apart is that we work together with the finance industry in order to respond to their needs. We have built a platform that is not only extremely user-friendly but that will also help the industry move towards a paperless onboarding process in the coming years. 

How have your colleagues contributed towards the success of your organisation?
At Wecan, we are trust network builders. Our small yet skilled team is committed to providing the best technical expertise and user experience to our clients. The entire team has spent a lot of time talking to the platform users in order to understand what their pain points are. Our ambition is nourished by a strong team spirit. In the daily professional life, this translates into simple, well-constructed and well-executed actions.

What are you going to do to stay on the front foot in a fast-growing but also challenging region such as this?
Earlier this year, the Blockchain Association for Finance was launched, it will allow the platform to stay on top of regulatory changes and enable Wecan Comply’s stakeholders to make strategic decisions about future features we develop.  

We are going to bring new use cases to the platform, other financial actors that have approached us and want to also benefit from our platform for their specific use case ( ie trust companies, insurance companies, other.) 

Then, the next step for Wecan Comply is to connect to official registers that will increase the simplicity of use and create even more trust in the data available on our platform. 

What challenges have you had to overcome to reach your present standard?
Our initial challenge was to bring financial actors together and understand their pain points and see if we could provide a solution that would meet their requirements. Our vision was not only to create a digital tool, but to create a real collaborative network between banks and their partners in which they can align on new ways of working together and drive a positive impact on both sides. We managed to overcome this challenge by having all actors actively engage in the discussion, and we built a proof of concept to allow them to decide if the idea would actually produce results for them. 

A second challenge was to be extremely didactic about blockchain technology. 

Cybersecurity and trust are at the heart of our mission. Therefore it is essential for us to make sure that each bank and EAM understand that they can control their data in a fully-encrypted and secured network, like in a private data vault. As a solution provider, we are only building the network, we will not be able to access any of the banks’ or EAMs’ documents.

To whom do you look for inspiration and ideas?
We pride ourselves in being a platform, that means we have a true open mindset. We look at how other platforms have managed to convince users at scale and we replicate those best practices. We are trying to bring a tech mindset to the financial industry.

What do you hope will be the result of receiving this accolade? How does it help your business in this region?
By receiving this award, we hope to gain visibility but also to show our legitimacy in the world of finance. We have already succeeded in bringing together some of the great names of Swiss finance. As from Q2 2021, we aim to accelerate our growth and this award will show people who do not know us yet, that industry experts recognise the impact our solution will have.