“It became clear to me there was a much broader opportunity because there's really no common infrastructure or data standards for $100 trillion in assets managed globally,” Mr. Poirier said. “There's people using spreadsheets and old accounting systems.” Mr. Poirier met Mr. Thiel, a founder of PayPal Holdings Inc., while an undergraduate at Columbia University. A few years as a bond-department coder at Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. convinced Mr. Poirier that finance needed better technology systems, a topic he said he brainstormed with Mr. Thiel.

http://www.investmentnews.com/article/20170110/FREE/170119996/morgan-stanley-teams-up-with-data-aggregation-company-addepar-to-get