Fourth Line acquires defunct TIQK’s tech

Yasmine Raso

Senior Journalist, Financial Newswire

8 June 2023

Financial services regulation technology (RegTech) firm, Fourth Line, has obtained the core intellectual property (IP) and proprietary technologies of former competitor and now-nonoperational compliance software provider, TIQK.

The technologies acquired include a full-stack technology platform comprising a range of micro-application software related to advice assurance, custom natural language processing (NLP) technologies, artificial intelligence (AI) code, AI integration tools, algorithms and other IP.

Fourth Line’s Executive Chairman, David Travers, said the acquisition was the first step to kick off the firm’s Advanced Technology Roadmap, where the technologies will be integrated into its “outsourced compliance brain” as part of other generative AI and machine learning (ML) enhancements.

“This was a step-change opportunity that couldn’t be ignored. It essentially means that a faster and better version of Fourth Line will be faster and cheaper to develop,” he said.

“In the short term, integration of the TIQK tech will allow Fourth Line to classify, review and analyse advice more rapidly. It will also help identify exceptions, including technical and systemic advice risks, with more confidence.

“It’ll also help diversify the revenue model for our first-generation product, by laying the technical groundwork for a SaaS (subscription) service for high-volume clients.”

Recently promoted Fourth Line chief executive Joel Ronchi, said TIQK’s technology stack has enabled the business to kickstart the development of its next solution targeting the advice assurance market with improved automation capabilities.

“Fourth Line is a technological consolidator of what’s largely a cottage industry staffed by small consultants, in-house compliance officers and sometimes, fellow financial advisers,” he said.

“Our first-generation product was sufficiently automated to attract around 12% of Australian advisers to our hybrid “bionic” advice service.

“This acquisition will expedite development of a second-generation product offering a turn-key digital compliance function at a fraction of current compliance costs, and which is exponentially faster and more accurate than any human equivalent.”

Travers will also collaborate with Professor Dan Hunter PhD, Fourth Line’s co-Chief Technology Officer and generative AI specialist, on the integration.