Long Beach, CA – Nine months into a program to help Registered Investment Advisor (RIA) firms develop “paperless offices,” Laserfiche^® announced that it has licensed its electronic document management systems (EDMS) to more than 100 RIA firms with more than 500 users, bringing the total number of RIA licenses from Laserfiche to almost 575.

“The RIA industry is demanding increasingly sophisticated electronic document management solutions, and the initial response to the Laserfiche program is tremendous,” said Chris Wacker, senior vice president of Business Development for Laserfiche. “We expect this trend to continue—our recent informal survey of RIAs at a major industry event found that 75 percent of them plan to implement electronic document management in the next year.”

Laserfiche has offered EDMS solutions for users in multiple industries globally since 1987, including financial services, where it serves several hundred broker-dealer firms and several thousand registered representatives. This year, the majority of the 6,000 financial advisors affiliated with Transamerica have implemented the Laserfiche solution.

In April 2007, Laserfiche announced a program geared toward helping Registered Investment Advisors in response to increasing demand from these independent, unaffiliated firms for business process automation to increase productivity and ease compliance. A white paper study released by Laserfiche (www.laserfiche.com/roi) shows that RIAs stand to increase their profits 40 to 55 percent, as well as the overall value of their firms, by investing in electronic document management technology.

According to the study, Laserfiche increases front-office and back-office efficiencies, streamlines regulatory compliance tasks and reduces rent costs. The study also found that RIA firms can increase their business valuations, from $200,000 for an emerging firm to upwards of $3.4 million for an enterprise-sized firm.

A recent report by Cerulli Associates, a Boston-based research firm, found that the RIA industry has grown from 11,741 firms in 2005 to 14,451 this year. The same Ceruilli survey found that 47 percent of RIAs believe regulatory compliance is the greatest challenge they currently face. ¹

Another recent survey of 239 RIAs by Joel P. Bruckenstein, an industry technology consultant and publisher of Virtual Office News (www.virtualofficenews.com), found that 62.1 percent were using some form of electronic document management, but 32.3% were using rudimentary systems that are “not the best document management programs from a legal and compliance standpoint.” ²

“Electronic document management is the great enabler of a productive and cost-effective compliance program,” Wacker said. “Our RIA customers consistently tell us that the Laserfiche solution enables them to comply with audits and other regulatory requirements with much greater efficiency than they did when they were using only paper documents and filing cabinets.”

In September, Laserfiche released Intuition^™, a new desktop software application customized to address the electronic document management needs of independent investment advisors and small advisory firms (www.intuitionpro.com).

A resource for over 25,000 organizations since 1987, Laserfiche (www.laserfiche.com) creates simple and elegant document management solutions that help organizations run smarter. Intuition is Laserfiche’s document management solution designed specifically for investment advisors.

Intuition contains all the features an investment advisor needs—at a highly-competitive price. Easy to install, use and maintain, Intuition helps entrepreneurs eliminate laborious, paper-based processes and spend more time actively serving their clients.

Intermarket Communications:
Andrew Yemma – 212-754-5450 andy@intermarket.com
Anne Bodnar – 212-754-5437 anne@intermarket.com

1. “RIA assets skyrocket 47%”, Investment News, Aaron Siegel, Oct. 29, 2007

2. “2007 Software Survey”, Financial Planning, Joel P. Bruckenstein, Dec. 1. 2007