Meet Aurelien Vicart, one of our founders & the brains behind VIZIBILITY
Who are you?
I’m Aurélien Vicart and I am 42 years old. I grew up in the south of France, near Carcassonne.
My dad used to be a shepherd for a flock of 300 sheep, and the vast expanse and freedom of the countryside made me fall in love with it. This is why I moved to the Bahamas with my wife and four wonderful kids.
What was your career path?
I began my career at Natixis, and then moved to Commerzbank where I worked for five years in Paris, New York, and London offices.
When my first child was on the way, I started looking for an opportunity to move to a smaller city. I eventually settled in Geneva, where I spent two years helping Exane-BNP Paribas develop the Latin American market before joining a fast-growing company, UCAP, where I became a partner. While there, I was not only the Head of Sales for LATAM, but I also led the effort to automate the structured products business. I established reporting tools that allowed us to monitor a structured product portfolio, which turned out to be a valuable tool for the internal sales force. After 12 years in the banking industry, my partner, Jerome Zenteno, and I decided to create VIZIBILITY in 2017 – an open platform for anyone involved with the structured product industry.
Which tips would you recommend to your colleagues as an entrepreneur to help them to thrive and not “burn out”?
To me, balance is the key to success. It’s important to understand that being an entrepreneur is more like running a marathon than a sprint. Although it may feel like a race at times, my advice is to slow down and do things the right way.
It’s also crucial to build a good team around you early on. You can’t do everything yourself, and you’re not always the smartest person in the room. Having a trusted team allows you to focus on the bigger picture and plan for your business’s next stage of growth.
Why did you create VIZIBILITY?
When we launched VIZIBILITY, we quickly realized that price comparison was not the key to growing our business. Service was the key to our success. We knew that a multi-issuer platform would come to the market and create efficient access to prices. It took around 10 years for equities and 5 years for the fixed income market to become efficient, but with today’s technology, it only took two years to see a multitude of multi-issuer platforms emerge. And all of them made the price comparison tool the most important part of their business model to sell more, without focusing on portfolio monitoring.
Therefore, we created VIZIBILITY to provide real added value to the industry by offering highly efficient reporting to monitor a structured product portfolio. It may seem crazy, but most private banks are still using Excel spreadsheets to monitor their structured product portfolios, and sharing such files with colleagues is nearly impossible. This is why we created a multi-level user platform with dedicated rights to satisfy the needs of all interested users, including issuers, trading desks, asset managers, and high-net-worth individuals. After the finalization of lifecycle management, we integrated all issuers into our platform and received firm quotes within 90 seconds. We first created a unique nomenclature of products that would fit any kind of structured product, enabling us to cover any payoff. With this solid base, we can consolidate and develop anything on top of it without limitations.
What was the hardest part of creating VIZIBILITY?
The initial stage of creating a unique nomenclature of products that will fit any kind of structured Products. We can now cover any payoff! Once you have this solid base, you can consolidate anything and develop on top of it without trouble or limitation.
Plus, it took us time to explain to our developer’s team how structured products work.
What is Vizibility’s edge compared to other platforms?
VIZIBILITY comes from the industry, our platform was designed by experts for experts with in-house and cutting-edge technology. This advantage allows us to understand and meet the industry’s needs and desires.
Our interface is pretty unique, easy to use, and self-explanatory, allowing users to get a quick snapshot of their situation.
Furthermore, our platform is easy and quick to implement and offers flexibility for tailor-made solutions based on our client’s needs.
Can platforms help increase the adoption of structured products? why?
Of course, as mentioned, we are here to change the industry. To make long-term partnerships with a sustainable business.
Many platforms offer education as a sales tactic. our aim is to democratize Structured Products by focusing on their users. By empowering users to analyze their portfolios, we enable them to make informed decisions and adjust their investments accordingly. Our role in this portfolio-building business is to provide advisors with the best tools to manage their portfolios effectively, while also fostering transparency and trust between them and their clients.
We also provide transparency between the advisor and the final client, which translates into trust, key to growing the pie.
Finally, we provide investment solutions to launch campaigns easily and efficiently which enlarges volumes. While we advocate for a balanced portfolio allocation, we also recognize the importance of advisors understanding structured notes and being able to explain them comfortably to their clients. By including structured notes in a diversified allocation, high-net-worth clients can benefit from reduced risk exposure.
We still see fear in the industry to have exposure to structured notes for different reasons, and we believe that it is not in the best interest of high-net-worth clients.
Future plans for VIZIBILITY
VIZIBILITY is only at the beginning of its route! We have a high-level roadmap to continue developing our platform.
In addition, we have created a community with our clients: private banks, broker-dealers, and insurance companies. We listen to their needs and work closely with them, we are a business-data-driven company. Our ultimate goal is to provide the best solutions in the industry.
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