Building wealth is a long process and can be complex, but Farther is bringing both technology and advisors to the table to make these kinds of services more accessible.
The wealth technology company was co-founded in 2019 by Taylor Matthews and Brad Genser, who say Farther is “a new kind of financial institution” catering to high-net-worth professionals building generational wealth but want the freedom of both an automated system and a professional.
Prior to Farther, Matthews, CEO, was an investment banker and management consultant before co-founding Essmart, a social enterprise company in India, and then moving over to a leadership position at fintech retirement advisory firm ForUsAll. Meanwhile, Genser, CTO, is a military veteran who previously worked at Goldman Sachs leading an artificial intelligence team in private wealth.
Capitalizing on their experiences, the pair created Farther to provide tools that are two-fold: one set for advisors to expand their businesses and one for clients to invest in ways that align with their goals using automation, artificial intelligence or one of the advisors. Advisors set the costs for using the platform.
Wealth management is big business with many startups bringing unique approaches. For example, PINA in Indonesia targets the middle class with investment services that don’t have high minimums and fees, while Tifin has both a consumer investment marketplace and one geared toward businesses.
Some new and unique features include what Genser called a “cash waterfall” that detects excess cash and enables clients to invest that into new vehicles. “As an advisor at Goldman, that was just something I couldn’t do,” he told TechCrunch.
There are also alternative investments that provide investment access in private equity and hedge fund portfolios, some with account minimums as low as $25,000.
In addition to quadrupling its AUM to more than $250 million this year, the company also grew its advisor count to over 20 after starting the year with six. Including those advisors, engineers and product team members Farther also doubled its staff size to more than 50 employees, Matthews added.
Farther closed a $15 million Series A round of funding in May that was led by Bessemer Venture Partners and included Khosla Ventures and MassMutual Ventures as new investors. They join existing investors Moneta Venture Capital, Context Ventures and Cota Capital.
The new capital gives Farther a total of $22 million in investments since 2019 and boosts its valuation to $50 million from $20 million, which was where the company was when it raised funding last year.
Matthews and Genser plan to deploy the Series A dollars into product development and hiring more talent ahead of demand.
“We’ve really come into our own this year in a way we are excited about,” Matthews told TechCrunch. “The growth we have experienced in the last two quarters, including quadrupling our assets under management, and closing on this investment, even in this tough fundraising environment, is a testament to the great stuff we have done so far.”