AI Wealth Management Startup Raises Significant Funding

Pioneering entrepreneurs Dillon Erb and Daniel Kobran have announced securing $15 million in funds to develop a bespoke artificial intelligence-based financial advisor.

Erb and Kobran previously sold their initial venture, Paperspace, a GPU cloud service, to DigitalOcean for $111 million. Their current venture, Autonomous Technologies Group (ATG), was conceptualized as they sought to better organize their finances post-sale.

ATG, which focuses on applied AI for finance, is emerging from under wraps with its debut offering, a wealth management application known as Autonomous.

Autonomous seeks to rival existing robo-advisors and typical wealth management firms, which Erb and Kobran criticize for providing impersonal advice or imposing high fees.

Instead of claiming to provide an AI capable of choosing the top stocks, Erb emphasizes that Autonomous aids users in adopting strategies similar to those of the super-wealthy, such as optimizing tax efficiency by managing individual stock holdings instead of index funds, and automatically tweaking portfolios for risk management.

Garry Tan, the CEO of Y Combinator, spearheaded ATG's $15 million funding round through a vehicle designed specifically for YC alumni partnerships. Tan, along with Erb and Kobran, joined forces during their initial involvement with YC in 2015. Both BoxGroup and Collaborative Fund also contributed to this funding round.

With a current team of 15 located in New York and San Francisco, the company plans to expand by hiring additional product engineers and AI specialists.

According to Tan, the financial advisory field is one of the last areas where human middlemen extract significant value without equivalent creation. He asserts that ATG is poised at the right moment with the right people to make a change.

Similar to startups like Stash, Vise, and Range, which leverage AI for wealth management, major banks are hastening to incorporate AI in transformative ways within the finance industry.

Scheduled to launch this quarter, the Autonomous app will be accessible free of charge for early adopters. It provides proactive portfolio insights by integrating real-time market data with personal lifestyle details, covering areas like investment choices, home buying, and employment offers.

Though Autonomous delivers complimentary guidance applicable to current accounts, the firm generates revenue through Autonomous Index—another service enabling users to trade with prior consent. This platform allows the creation of portfolios with individual stocks, offering potential tax benefits and enhanced personalization.

Although Autonomous is ATG's leading product, the company's ultimate ambition is to create a whole financial institution run by AI, performing tasks traditionally handled by human advisors.

Kobran mentioned that ATG is working towards aligning a complete financial landscape for users, encompassing retirement plans, cryptocurrency, and startup shares. Over time, they aim to include services like venture investments and estate planning.

The goal is to make every service a billionaire's family office offers widely available.