Ian McKenna

Some people have called Ian McKenna the OG of AdviceTech. By the time he established Financial Technology Research Centre in 1995, long before the term “Fintech“ became part of the industry lexicon, he already had two decades of experience in the industry. Having started work with Guardian Royal Exchange in 1974 before mobbing to a London broking firm in 1976 he opened his first independent insurance and financial advice practice in 1981. A parallel entrepreneur, he runs a consulting firm and three Fintech start-ups as well as holding a number of pro bono industry roles.

He has been the U.K.’s leading AdviceTech columnist for over 30 years; the last 27 with Money Marketing (moneymarketing.co.uk), and three before that with FT Adviser.

In 2019, he founded ProtectionGuru.co.uk, a technical information site for life insurance advisers. In 2022 he was given the UK Life Insurance Leader of the Year award by LifeSearch the U.K.’s largest independent life insurance advice firm.

The following year saw the launch of Protection Guru Pro, a value-for-money based life insurance comparison. In July this year Protection Guru Pro completed a hat trick of wins in consecutive years at the European Fintech awards, twice as European InsurTech of the Year and once as Disruptor of the Year. Benefits Guru, a workplace pensions comparison service, was launched in 2020.

In 2021 McKenna launched AdviserSoftware.com, an advice tech review site which now includes analysis of over 250 different advice tech propositions produced by a team of analysts, each with at least a decade experience working in advice firms. In July, he commenced publishing the monthly AdviceTech & AI – Everyone You Need To Know report.

He passionately believes advice tech should be global. While the World Bank recognises that there are 190m+ middle class and above consumers in the US, i.e. the natural target for financial planning, the bank also identifies that there are over 3.8 billion middle class and above consumers globally. McKenna believes there is a massive opportunity to use AdviceTech to make financial planning affordable to that additional 3.6 billion consumers globally and is attending Advise AI to meet with technology providers firms who wish to launch their propositions in other countries around the world.