Tech platform Trustworthy started in 2019 with a seemingly difficult business model: Get families to trust uploading documents detailing their livelihood — financials, IDs, assets, taxes, wills, even info about their children and dogs — onto a single digital platform where authorized users can easily access it when needed.
"As we talked to more and more folks, we found out that they were dealing with this, basically fragmentation of their information. It's little silos of bits of pieces all over the place," said Nathaniel Robinson, founder and CEO of San Francisco-based Trustworthy. Say "I need the VIN number for the car. I need some information about the kids because I'm filling out school forms or if something were to happen to me, would my family know where to go … to find a treasure map of all the important things?"
Trustworthy trademarked The Family Operating System and has grown to 11,000 household subscribers. More recently, it added enhanced technologies such as AI and branched more into business-to-business services, opening its platform to advisors, broker-dealers and other groups like AARP.
Trustworthy was among roughly a dozen tech startups selected by AARP this week to participate in an eight-week tech accelerator program called AgeTech Collaborative.
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"Each startup has been selected for its potential to transform lives through innovative technology that combines functionality with accessibility," AARP said in an announcement on LinkedIn. "They will benefit from deep consumer insights, expert strategic advice, and guidance on creating intuitive, user-friendly designs — essential for their success and broad adoption."
This tech vendor profile is among
Name: Trustworthy.
Website: trustworthy.com
Size of Trustworthy: Trustworthy has 11,000 household subscribers on its platform.
Products and services offered: A tech-based platform that securely stores documents and data for families with AI-backed functions that help walk users through identifying which documents to upload and how to access specific information when needed in seconds. For example, it can help a user find a financial document that a loan officer might suddenly request to process a mortgage; or if a family member needs access to certain documents in the event of a death; or if a user needs to quickly pull up insurance documents in the event of storm damage.
In one case, Robinson said the firm had a research customer who wanted to upload a map of where his precious metals were buried on his property so his chosen heirs could find it once he died.
"That sort of became a funny metaphor for what Trustworthy is. It doesn't necessarily need to be in Trustworthy, so long as it's a pointer to where it lives," Robinson said.
Last year, Trustworthy also added a so-called partner portal for professionals like advisors to use with clients as well as a business category so users can store information on businesses they might own or in which they have an investment stake.
Who Trustworthy aims to serve: Families and then professionals who families work with, like advisors, RIAs, financial coaches and accountants.
What kind of problems Trustworthy is trying to solve:
Simply put, Robinson said it's essentially helping people "clean their garage" of documents.
"It's really hard to get people to go from zero information and trustworthy, to a lot of information and trustworthy. We've been working on addressing that and the notion of problems like cleaning the garage," he said. "No one wants to spend their weekend cleaning the garage, so we spent a lot of time figuring out how to make this really easy and effortless."
A similar concept is meant for the advisor side. In the partner portal, Robinson said advisors can create accounts for their clients, upload documents and identify missing info that the client can find and upload, which helps reduce the back-and-forth hassles of emailing or sifting through documents later when it might be urgently needed.
How Trustworthy is different from competitors: There are many platforms that hold and search for financial data or household information, but Robinson said the automation aspects they're developing through AI is "a real key differentiator for Trustworthy."
The tech firm recently launched an AI-backed autopilot that helps detect the type of document being loaded, whether it be a tax document, information about a pet or a bank statement, and where to categorize it.
"The advisor side of the equation loves this as well because they do a lot of work on behalf of [client] families, and this automation of getting stuff into Trustworthy and mapping the relationships … it understands a document, where it needs to go, and relative to all the other things you already have or don't have," he said.
What does it cost: There is a platform fee for advisors that Robinson did not detail on price but said they were "contemplating a per-advisor fee."
As for individual users,
Next development: Trustworthy is continuing to work on ways to implement more AI tools such as an enhanced search function across the entire platform that will eventually become more of a conversational tool with users about their data. For example, it might allow a user to ask the AI search assistant to show all their deductibles across all of the insurance policies, and in an instant.
The biggest challenge(s) going forward: Robinson said Trustworthy has not reached a level of being "stackable" with other platforms, like a CRM platform for advisors, which is something they are working on.
"It's probably our biggest shortcoming today is that we don't sync. A lot of the firms want us to sync with their CRM or some other system," he said. "And this is why we're better suited for firms who don't have a complete stack yet … younger firms that can move more quickly. I think we'll be able to knock those down over time."
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