“They were a great fit for the thesis. I did a lot of research into the appropriate PE firm. They all had different strategies.”
But like all private equity companies, AnaCap will inevitably exit the business. "As an executive team, we are building the business for the long term to support our advisers with both technology and service," says Mill.
"AnaCap is supporting that journey through investment and is committed to continuing to do that in the medium term. The business is profitable, and following any AnaCap sale we will be able to fund future investment whatever the ownership structure."
‘People are attracted to us more now’
Novia is currently focused on growth, which means attracting assets, refining its technology and drawing in new talent.
Rival platform Nucleus accused Novia earlier this year of “aggressively” recruiting its staff, amidst the departure of four of Nucleus’ employees to Novia, pointing to a competitive climate for hiring in the platform space.
“Clearly we need to have better people. We’ve been delighted that we’ve been able to attract a lot of people from other platforms to our business. Some really high-calibre people.”
As well as Nucleus, other executive new hires have come from Parmenion, Wealth Club and Brightside Insurance.
Mill says these new hires have been attracted to Novia because of its strategy and its culture.
“People are attracted to us more now [versus a year ago]. It is a balance. The four businesses we have are all startups [platforms Novia, Wealthtime, Amber, and DFM Copia], they have a good startup mentality, and we’re trying to maintain that.
“But we are growing and we’re a bigger business. So it is a balance between having that startup mentality and fintech focus, but also having that knowledge and experience of platforms because we are a more mature business.
Novia has revealed plans to rebrand the entire business to Wealthtime later this year in a bid to seem less abstract and more like a fintech.
Novia’s CEO is also conscious of attracting people into the platform industry, which is why the company is in the process of restructuring its graduate programme.
“The industry needs to attract more people into it. What we don’t want to do is just take people from other platforms. What that won’t give us a diversity of opinions.”
Over the past 12 months, Mill says the company has “worked really hard” to improve the diversity of hires within the business.
“We’ve a journey to go, but that’s one of the big attractions – diversity of culture.”
‘There’s always price pressure’
When it comes to platform pricing, Novia is the priciest in terms of the percentage fee it charges of client assets up to £500,000.
