ForwardLane Retains IP Co-sell Status and Drives Success on Azure Marketplace with Invisory
ForwardLane, a data analytics platform designed for wealth and asset managers, built their solution around a unique pain point in financial services: Wealth and asset managers struggle to offer personalized, compliant services and accurate reporting to customers at scale.
The ForwardLane platform addresses this pain point by leveraging AI and risk models to automate and streamline client outreach. The results? Clients receive an actionable and accurate analysis of their finances in minutes, as opposed to days (or even weeks).
Why Azure Marketplace for financial services
As ForwardLane began scouting opportunities to unlock revenue streams and close new deals, they were drawn to selling on cloud marketplaces. Despite AWS’s dominance in cloud infrastructure, the ForwardLane team noticed that more companies were embracing a multi-cloud approach, reducing their dependence on one marketplace. This meant that more financial services companies were seeking solutions on the Azure Marketplace. ForwardLane was also drawn to Azure because of Microsoft’s advancements in AI.
To kickstart their Azure journey, ForwardLane participated in two programs for ISVs – ISV Success Program and Pegasus Program for Fintech Startups. This led to free software, Azure credits, and connections with senior people at Microsoft, enabling ForwardLane to become IP co-sell eligible.
Why Invisory for Azure Marketplace
Despite participating in Microsoft’s partner programs, ForwardLane was still not transacting on the Azure Marketplace. A change in Azure requirements for IP co-sell status in 2023 meant that ForwardLane needed to fast-track their transactability in less than 3 weeks. This would have required hiring or outsourcing developers who specialize in Azure APIs, which is expensive and hard to find. With the Invisory platform, ForwardLane retained IP co-sell status in less than 3 business days, saving the fintech startup the months of time it would have taken them to recruit a Microsoft developer and build an API from scratch.
Like many ISVs, the ForwardLane team lacked the domain knowledge within the Microsoft Azure ecosystem. “There was virtually no way I could have become transactable without Invisory,” the CEO, Nathan Stevenson, explained. As the member of the ForwardLane team with the most domain knowledge, the CEO found himself as the primary liaison between Microsoft, which wasn’t sustainable or scaleable. “The Invisory customer support team is really responsive and provides tremendous support. They are essential to ForwardLane’s sales process.”
According to the ForwardLane CEO, Microsoft opportunities fall off quickly if you’re not continuously configuring your Partner Center setup or staying on top of communication with cloud sales reps. “Without Invisory, it was difficult to follow Microsoft’s instructions. We had no way of knowing if we were moving in the right direction. I don’t know who we would have hired – we probably would have failed.”
Today, the Invisory platform provides co-sell referrals and bi-directional sync with ForwardLane’s Hubspot and Azure instances. The Invisory platform has also enabled the fintech ISV to express private offers.
The future
As ForwardLane scales, Invisory will continue to be their secret weapon for driving success on the Azure Marketplace. ForwardLane is looking forward to continuing growing their sales strategy with the Invisory platform in their tech stack.
