Digital consulting

Web applications for automated investment planning for private investors – so-called robo-advisors – are being viewed with rapidly increasing interest at present. Robo-advisors can be used for one-off investment and regular saving purposes.

Intelligent automated advice?

Germany’s robo-advisors are generally a digital access channel to financial portfolio management (asset management) services.

It is therefore increasingly open to question whether the designation “robo-advice” is justified for the mere initiation of an asset management mandate, since real advice is not given in the case of the solutions that are most common in practice. We take up this idea in our working paper “Digitale Beratung - Verfügbarkeit intelligenter Software für die Finanzberatung”.

In view of the practice currently prevalent in Germany, the potential for digitalizing financial advice is far from exhausted. On the contrary, there are numerous approaches for offering “real advice” with innovative technological concepts. However, there is considerable reticence within the industry in this respect, not least due to regulatory constraints.

We have therefore extended our research work in the field of digital consulting to issues that are not specific to a particular industry.

Intelligent chatbots and assistants

See also: Laboratory for Applied Artificial Intelligence

See also: Seminar: No need to fear AI – What every manager should know about artificial intelligence

Our application-oriented research for use in practice

Within the “Robo-Advice” research area, innovative IT approaches for designing user interaction are being tested at Nuremberg Tech.

The aim is to make the digital consulting process as similar as possible to a personal consultation by human actors, while also exploiting all the advantages of computer-aided automation (standardization and objectivity, process costs, complexity processing capacity).

We are currently looking for interested providers who want to automate their consulting activities and work with us to develop tangible, innovative solutions in this respect.

Current study: Digital consulting – availability of intelligent software for financial consulting

December 2018

“Robo-advice” promises to radically change the way money is invested using the latest technical innovations. Robot-based financial consulting should radically reduce costs and make more flexible, customized and efficient solutions for investment and asset management available, while at the same time reducing the human factor or making human consultants completely unnecessary. But you will search in vain for artificial intelligence (AI).

To our working paper (in German) “Digitale Beratung - Verfügbarkeit intelligenter Software für die Finanzberatung”

Current study: Robo-advice from the perspective of independent asset managers

Digitalization potential in investment consulting and asset management from the provider’s perspective

May 2018

The paper by Prof. Thomas Bahlinger and Marissa Schutsch presents the results of a short survey of independent asset managers on the subject of robo-advice.

Most asset managers recognize a certain relevance in digitalized investment advice and asset management. However, there is still a lack of concrete ideas as to how this development could affect their own business or how new technologies could be used appropriately.

Download study (in German) “Robo Advice aus der Perspektive unabhängiger Vermögensverwalter” as a PDF (6 pages)

Current study: Digitalization in asset management

Digitalization potential in investment consulting and asset management for private investors

September 2017

In this current paper, Prof. Thomas Bahlinger shows the status of digitalization in asset management as well as the opportunities and challenges from an information technology perspective.

There is great potential for digitalization, especially for risk profiling, investor onboarding and event-based portfolio adjustment. Risk profiling and dialogue with investors benefit from approaches using artificial intelligence (AI).

The contents of the study were published in the magazine “die bank”: Bahlinger, Thomas (2018): Private Geldanlagen lassen sich vollständig digitalisieren. Anlageberatung und Vermögensverwaltung. In: die bank (1/2018), p. 28–33.

Further information on the study is available from the author on request – see below for contact details.

Prof. Bahlinger regularly analyzes the robo-advisor market and works with financial service providers such as banks, fee-based investment advisors, and asset managers in various collaborative models.