Orion Advisor Services goes mobile with advisor-branded apps for the iPhone and Android

This means that an advisory firm will be able to direct its clients to download an app listed under the name of that firm, rather than a generic Orion app. Each app will function exactly the same, other than the name and logo.

“More and more investors have been using smart phones” says Eric Clarke, president of Omaha, Neb.,-based Orion. “Our app was really built for client use.”

For a related story that goes deeper into Orion’s strategy, see How Orion Advisor Services became a mobile device pioneer and how competitors plan to react.

Clients will be able to log in to the mobile app with the same credentials they use to log in to Orion’s client portal in order to track their portfolios on their mobile device.

As of today there are four re-branded versions ordered by advisory firms awaiting approval in the iPhone and Android app stores, and dozens more lined up to be released as soon as Orion’s development team can churn them out. Clarke says that after Apple’s approval of the initial Orion app, which advisors can already use and allow their clients to use, the approval process for each subsequent rebranded version will take less time.

The re-branded versions are available for free to all advisors on Orion’s platform, on a first-come first-served basis.

HTML5

Orion’s app relies heavily on HTML5, which is the newest language for coding web pages. The app has native navigational elements that are customized for the iPhone and Android, but the rest of the elements are served on-the-fly in a browser-like window from Orion’s servers.

Advisors and their clients can see
portfolio holdings and values

This technique is becoming common among the mobile apps we’ve seen cropping up to serve advisors, in large part because it means there is no need to store any data on the device itself, which would present security issues. Black Diamond uses this same technique in its BlueSky mobile app for the iPad. See: Black Diamond releases BlueSky Mobile for the iPad.

You can think of it like a tiny web-browser window nicely bundled up inside an application that runs natively on Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android. If your Internet connection speed is fast enough, it will feel very similar to an all-native app that uses all platform-specific elements.

Clarke acknowledged that sometimes with slower speed connections the browser-view is not as nice, and said that Orion will be looking into supporting a more native experience in the future, with some data cached on the device.

Vendors like Orion and Black Diamond have an easier time bundling up portfolio data into a mobile app than some of their competitors, since all of the data is already stored on Orion’s central servers. All they need to do for an app like this is to build a new HTML interface for viewing the data on a small screen, and then wrap that inside an application that runs on the popular mobile platforms. For vendors that have all or some of their advisors running desktop software, it’s trickier to get the portfolio data to a mobile device over the Internet.

Of the major asset custodians, we’ve seen Pershing take advantage of this same ability to easily display data from a central server within a mobile app, and TD Ameritrade is planning to do the same. See: Nevin looks under the NetX360 hood after it gets 100,000 new users and some overhauling and Joining the industry-wide trend, TD Ameritrade announces its upcoming project for 'open architecture’ technology integration.

Reporting

The app is mostly limited to performance reporting data, according to Clarke, and will be expanded to include other features from Orion’s web-based platform in the future.

One handy feature is the ability to generate full-sized PDF reports any time and print them from a networked printer. Clarke explained that this allows advisors to print up reports on the go or even once they have already arrived at a meeting with an investor.

He said that advisors sometimes end up using the mobile app even in their own office. “The iPad just sort of becomes their tool of preference over booting up their computer, which might take ten minutes.”

Advisors can also use the app
to pull up contact info for
clients. Once they get to the
contact screen, they can tap to
call or email a client, or
display a map of their address.

Beyond BlackBerry

When we asked Clarke what had prompted Orion to support the world of mobile devices, he explained that it had finally become obvious that mobile platforms would actually work after he made the switch away from BlackBerry.

“I was not a believer as a BlackBerry user that there was much to it until we go ahold of these other mobile devices,” says Clarke. He pointed out that the BlackBerry is great for email and SMS, but doesn’t handle web browsing very well.

Clarke is optimistic about the future of the mobile app. “It’s been a pretty big hit, and it was a simple adoption for us.” Orion hired one outside contractor to assist with development, and the project has taken two months from start to initial launch.

We’ll be interested to see what direction Orion takes with additional features beyond viewing account data.

“We’ve always got more ideas than time to execute,” says Clarke.