Program Fosters Emerging Technologies that Benefit the Accounting and Finance Profession

NEW YORK (Feb. 28, 2023) – Today the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) and CPA.com announced its 2023 Startup Accelerator cohort at a kick-off meeting held at AICPA headquarters in New York. This year’s participants include five early-stage companies pursuing a variety of solutions in audit, accounting, tax and e-commerce.

The Startup Accelerator supports the growth of early-stage technology companies benefiting the accounting and finance ecosystem. Selected companies receive focused insight into the evolving needs of finance and accounting professionals, access to firms and finance leaders who are shaping their profession and a $25,000 grant. They also benefit from marketplace intelligence and guidance from AICPA and CPA.com senior leaders and the program’s advisory board members. Selected companies have an opportunity to showcase their solutions at AICPA & CIMA ENGAGE, the premier conference for the accounting and finance profession, to be held in June at the ARIA Resort & Casino in Las Vegas.

“At CPA.com, we’re focused on empowering the accounting profession for the digital age through innovative products and solutions designed to transform their practice areas,” said Kacee Johnson, vice president – Strategy and Innovation, CPA.com. “The Accelerator program has been instrumental in helping us stay ahead of emerging trends while connecting CPA firms with leading-edge solutions uniquely tailored to meet the evolving needs of the profession.”

The 2023 cohort is comprised of the following technology solutions:

• 4impactdata – The Texas-based company created the “first ever knowledge as a service” business guidance system that equips CPA firms to be the strategic partner their business clients need. The client advisory platform is pre-built on the latest Analytics-AI cloud platform, includes industry best practices, proactive alerts and benchmarking across clients.
• Audit Sight – The company’s platform eliminates manual work for auditors, diligence and private equity providers by automating financial transaction verification. The solution automates the audit testing process and generates a GAAS-compliant workpaper.
• Synder – Based in San Francisco, the business intelligence platform for CFO and accounting professionals helps automate repetitive tasks around multi-source e-commerce data and translate it into actionable insights for businesses, enabling accountants with a monthly advisory service for their clients.
• TaxPlanIQ – Based in Texas, the SaaS software solution automates an entire tax planning engagement from selling the plan to implementing all tasks throughout the year, and educational resources to support the accountant with videos, checklists and templates of 100 tax strategies.
• VERIFYiQ – The Vancouver-based company offers solutions that augment workflow systems and CRMs to make bookkeeping more accurate and efficient, including a practice management solution that automates quality control reviews and a tool that enables sales teams to scope a potential client's books in under five minutes.

For more information about the startup accelerator, please visit cpa.com/accelerator.

About CPA.com

CPA.com brings innovative solutions to the accounting profession, either in partnership with leading providers or directly through its own development. The company has established itself as a thought leader on emerging technologies and as the trusted business advisor to practitioners in the United States, with a growing global focus. Our company’s core mission is to drive the transformation of practice areas, advance the technology ecosystem for the profession, and lead technology research and innovation efforts for practitioners.

A subsidiary of the American Institute of CPAs, the company is also part of the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants, the world’s most influential organization representing the profession. For more information, visit CPA.com.

About the American Institute of CPAs

The American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) is the world’s largest member association representing the CPA profession, with more than 431,000 members in the United States and worldwide, and a history of serving the public interest since 1887. AICPA members represent many areas of practice, including business and industry, public practice, government, education and consulting. The AICPA sets ethical standards for its members and U.S. auditing standards for private companies, nonprofit organizations, and federal, state and local governments. It develops and grades the Uniform CPA Examination, offers specialized credentials, builds the pipeline of future talent and drives professional competency development to advance the vitality, relevance and quality of the profession.

Kacee Johnson, VP of Strategy and Innovation at CPA.com, an AICPA Company, joins the show to walk us through the 2023 Accounting and Finance Hype Cycle. Learn about the methodology, why certain trends move forward vs. back, and more.

https://proconnect.intuit.com/podcast/?s_cid=soc_FAM_LI_O_BR_20230110_1

Amy Bridges of CPA.com dives into what it takes to build a successful client advisory services practice, based on the results of the latest CAS Benchmarking Survey.

https://www.accountingtoday.com/podcast/the-hallmarks-of-a-top-performing-cas-practice

That level of profitability has plenty of firms building or exploring launching their own CAS offerings, but with CAS varying so much from firm to firm, and many of the practices being so young, it can be difficult to get a clear picture of what the optimal structure might be, and what sort of metrics to pay attention to.

https://www.accountingtoday.com/list/cas-by-the-numbers

Interactive cloud-based platform offers simple way to bridge compliance and advisory

NEW YORK (Dec. 19, 2022) – To support the evolving role of tax practitioners as they continue to move beyond tax compliance to providing tax and financial planning advisory services, CPA.com announced today that it has formed a partner program with Asset-Map, a leading interactive, cloud-based platform that organizes an individual or family’s financial instruments into a clear, graphical layout. The interactive 'map’ can be used by tax advisors and personal financial planners to provide strategic insights into their clients’ holistic financial wellness.

As client expectations increase and more components of tax compliance become automated, the future role of the tax professional will center around packaging compliance with advisory to give clients a more comprehensive planning experience. Asset-Map supports the evolving role of tax practitioners by facilitating better human advice engagement between the advisor and the client. Advice engagement is a critical component of personalized financial planning, which includes delivering integrated guidance to clients in a structured way to help them make sound financial decisions.

“Asset-Map makes it easy for CPA tax advisors to quickly gather a holistic view of their clients’ financial life, including the gaps, opportunities and pitfalls with respect to current decisions,” said Adam Holt, CFP, CEO of Asset-Map. “This vantage enables CPAs to offer strategic insights and proactive financial advice that clients are expecting of them.”

Thousands of CPAs, tax advisors and financial planning professionals have leveraged Asset-Map solutions to help more than 1.25 million individuals and families understand their financial picture and plan for the future. Ross Riskin, CPA, PFS, Chief Learning Officer at Investments & Wealth Institute remarked, “As many tax professionals get wrapped up in the compliance side of the business and focus on accounting for events that have happened in the past – what better way to demonstrate to clients that we’re focused on helping them plan for their future as well as providing them with a visual map – an Asset-Map^® Report – that helps them understand where they’ve been, where they are, and where they are going.”

Some of the key features of the Asset-Map platform include:

• Quick client data collection – Advisors can use Asset-Map’s brandable Discovery feature to invite clients to share their financial inventory in minutes.
• Visualization of household finances – The solution’s visualization tool enables advisors to see a comprehensive financial picture and advise clients on decisions that can be improved.
• Financial Fire Drill Alerts – Practitioners can instantly screen clients’ household financial well-being to determine their ability to fund disruptive life events.
• Connection to firm data sources - Asset-Map connects to numerous technology platforms, including customer relationship management (CRM), planning, portfolio management and file storage systems.
• Track progress to financial goals – The solution helps advisors and their clients identify funding gaps toward financial goals and then track their progress and required actions going forward.

“Most clients are looking to their tax advisors to provide a broader accounting of their overall financial standing but are hesitant to ask for it—and compliance work can be very transactional. When tax compliance is combined with insight and a more complete picture of overall financial health, it becomes an ongoing engagement and the value to the client rises significantly,” said Erik Asgeirsson, president and CEO of CPA.com, the technology and business subsidiary of the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA). “Asset Map gives CPA tax advisors a simple pathway for initiating a structured conversation with clients about tax and financial planning.”

As part of the CPA.com and Asset-Map program, AICPA members are eligible to receive an exclusive discount on the Asset-Map monthly subscription fee.

To learn about how tax advisors can expand their services around tax compliance to include strategic advisory, register to join CPA.com’s free CPE webinar, “Advice Engagement — The Next Step for Tax Practice Innovation” Jan. 11 at 3 p.m. ET.

To learn more about Asset-Map, visit cpa.com/assetmap.

About CPA.com
CPA.com brings innovative solutions to the accounting profession, either in partnership with leading providers or directly through its own development. The company has established itself as a thought leader on emerging technologies and as the trusted business advisor to practitioners in the U.S., with a growing global focus. CPA.com is a subsidiary of the American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) and part of the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants (AICPA & CIMA), the most influential body of accounting and financial professionals worldwide.

About Asset-Map
Asset-Map is a Software-as-a-Process experience for financial professionals who provide in-person and remote advice. Typically included as part of the advice engagement process, Asset-Map centers around the digital visualization of household facts to build highly customized, design-thinking presentations in minutes that help advisors and their customers make better financial decisions. Asset-Map is used by thousands of professionals worldwide, having mapped over 1.25 million people and $1.5 trillion in financial instruments.