In this episode of the Connector Podcast recorded at ON23 in Venice, host Koen Vanderhoydonk interviews Kurt from Objectway. The conversation centers on Objectway’s “Diamond Framework” – four interlinked facets of modern wealth management: experience, offering, configuration, and sustainability. Kurt explains how these pillars enable hyper‑personalisation and contextual banking, meeting client demands in real time while aligning with ESG and regulatory expectations such as ESG‑MiFID. The discussion moves to market dynamics, comparing Europe (Benelux) and Canada, and highlights the looming inter‑generational wealth transfer that threatens asset‑under‑management if firms do not adapt. Kurt advocates redesigning platforms to be family‑wide, digital‑first, and sustainable, noting the massive legacy‑system re‑platforming challenge faced by many banks. The episode also weaves in reflections on tradition as a driver of innovation, using Venice as a metaphor. Throughout, the tone is conversational and optimistic, positioning Objectway’s approach as a strategic response to evolving client expectations and regulatory pressures.
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Welcome to the Connector Podcast, an ongoing conversation connecting fintechs, banks, and regulators worldwide. Join CEO and founder Koen Vanderhoydonk as you learn more about the latest available trends and solutions in the markets. This episode is proudly sponsored by ON23, organized by Objectway.
Welcome to another podcast episode right from Venice at ON23. And I have a very nice guest with me, which I know for a long time. It's Kurt, and Kurt works for Objectway. And Kurt, today, diamonds are forever. What's happening with the diamonds?
Yeah, Koen, thank you very much for having us and welcome to OMEN23 in beautiful Venice. Diamonds are forever, and I hope that also Objectway will be forever.
Makes sense.
Makes sense. We have, with our team, in the last few months, we have tried to look at the reality of wealth management. We have seen that staying ahead in wealth management is not that easy. And that's the reason why we have been thinking and say, what can we do and what will we have to do to deliver additional value to our clients. And we have tried to segregate that in 3, 4 components that we have interconnected like you interconnect a diamond. You know, the diamond has many facets. Some of the facets are, are interlinked, and if you have 3 of them or 4 of them, they all link together. And that's what we have tried to do. Now, for us, there are 4 facets in current wealth management. So, first of all is experience, the second one is offering, the third one is configuration, and the fourth one is sustainability. This goes very fast.
Yeah, well, because what brings them together? I mean, a diamond only makes sense if it's a nice piece of art.
Exactly. But all the facets are linked to each other because there are only 4. And we see what is important in wealth management today is delivering what the client wants at the moment that the client wants it in a sustainable way. So what we called also hyper-personalization or conscious banking, contextual banking, that is all integrated in this business model. Diamond Framework.
And because I was listening this morning to your big chief and he was explaining that sustainability is like an add-on, it's a cherry on the cake. Why is it on top of it?
Because clients and even also employees, they want to work in an environment and clients want to receive services from their banks and from the wealth manager. which are compatible to their view of sustainability. They do not want to waste paper anymore. They do not want to waste energy anymore. So, you don't have to be the best one as a private bank or a wealth manager. You don't have to be the best one in sustainability, but it needs to be compatible with what your client has as a view of you as a company.
So, it almost boils back to this hyper-personalization.
Indeed, indeed.
It's also what ESG MiFID is about.
Yeah, absolutely. Contextual banking. What the client wants at the moment that the client wants it in the way that the client wants it.
And today it's a super nice conference. It's a customer event. So which is the typical type of customer that you guys deal with?
Our clients are all in wealth management. That has been our DNA for the last 30 years. But in wealth management, of course, you have different facets. You have retail banks who are offering wealth services to clients. You have private banks. You have independent wealth managers. And then you have the asset managers. These are most of our clients that are here today, and there are a lot of them. They are from this space.
Well, Curt, I also saw on your LinkedIn that you're no longer— I mean, for a while already— not only focused on Belgium, but there's wider landscape that you're covering, even going up to Canada. Would you see a difference between, for example, what's happening in Europe versus the things that are happening in this case Canada?
I believe that we have selected a number of target markets with Objectway, and Canada was one of them. And we have done that because we believe that if you go to Canada or you go to France, The business of wealth management is pretty much the same. You have a little bit of a different incarnation of regulations, but in a way, the regulator does not reinvent the wheel. So regulations in Canada, regulations in Belgium, regulations in France, it all comes down to the same thing.
And in terms of Well, customer base, because also today there has been some introduction about the transfer of wealth going to the younger generation. Is this something similar like in Canada than it is in Europe?
It is, but I believe that the transfer of wealth to the younger generation is something that is pretty much underestimated by the business.
Well, the figures showed that as well today.
Exactly, exactly. And it is, it is, it has been proven by a number of companies that I have spoken with in the recent past that wealth managers are pretty much focused on the people that they are familiar with. But if they go broader in the family, the children, the spouses, these are less known. But It is really a threat for a wealth manager that this transfer might mean that they will lose the asset under management.
And in your opinion, Curt, what would be then the next best action that a wealth manager should take or has to take in order to capture this younger generation?
I believe that systems have to be designed in a way that they are accessible for more people of the family. So the one-on-one sessions and wining and dining, that has been the classical way of communicating and talking with clients in a one-to-one basis. I think that it's not the right approach anymore. And the communication about the assets and the wealth of a family has to be distributed and discussed in another way, compatible also with the way younger people are operating.
And earlier it has been said that the glue to this story could be ESG, could be sustainability, meaning younger generation may be more triggered by what's happening around sustainability.
Absolutely, absolutely. And there also in the business you have the big discussion, what is important? Is this ESG or is it the performance of the portfolio? Because of course 2 go hand in hand.
It's provocative thinking, but I was listening to a professor not so long ago which was around sustainability, and he said it cannot be that when you put a restriction on a portfolio that per definition you have better results. It should be the other way around. So it needs to be a preference of you deliberately choosing and maybe jeopardizing slightly on the performance, but focusing on ESG.
It has to be a combination of the two. You cannot have your wealth managed in an ESG-preferable way, everything. So it has to be a combination of risk, performance, and ESG.
Today we are here in Venice, and this morning we had one of the prominent people, a professor from Venice, talking about how to innovation, and I thought he was particularly inspiring, especially by the words, culture or tradition is a successful way of innovation. What brought you to Venice? Is there a link with what you do today?
Yeah, absolutely. And what I remembered from his speech, I only remembered a few words, is that tradition was innovation at that time.
Yeah, it's great.
So you have to think about it. Tradition is not by definition bad. So tradition is also innovation. I think what we wanted to— the story behind Venice is that we wanted to show that indeed what has been and what was innovative at that time, because if you go into the city and if you imagine how this city was built so many years ago without the the techniques that we have today. So it was really very, very creative and it was innovation at that time. So, but what we want to show is that this innovation can still trigger other innovations. So you really go from step to the other step.
No, and that's exactly what the professor was actually preaching. It was a real nice talk.
So what I remember from that, I was impressed by the statement that indeed that tradition was the innovation of yesterday.
Yeah, strong statement.
And it generates the next innovation.
Last question.
Is it finished already?
Time flies when you're having fun, Bert. What would you see as the most prominent trends, maybe take Benelux, around wealth management?
If I look into the Benelux, I believe that there is a lot of potential, there are a lot of discussions ongoing in replatforming. Don't forget that a lot of the banks and the wealth managers, they have been building systems for the last 20, 30, maybe some of them 35, 40 years. They have been merging, banks have been merging, there has been huge investments in integrating businesses. If I talk to private banks, you see that their architecture is huge.
Legacy.
Legacy, dat weet ik al. Now it becomes with a big L. Now after 20, 30 years, the risk is getting higher that also the people who know this legacy system, that they will disappear in 5, 7, 8 years. So there are a lot of organizations that come to us and and explain them their problem. And that is a real problem, so the replatforming. But it's a huge opportunity. It's also for them a huge opportunity, again, to create new systems, leveraging also the knowledge that software and service companies like Objectway have in this matter, and also provide again this contextual banking, delivering what the client needs at the moment that he needs it.
Brilliant. Kurt, thank you so much for being in the podcast today.
Pleasure.
I'm sure we'll catch up later today.
Absolutely. I would say enjoy the rest of your day.
Thank you so much, Kurt. Thank you also to the listeners for tuning in, and please stay tuned because more news coming from ON 2023. Thank you so much.
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