R.I.-Switzerland fintech Light Frame raises $1.7M in pre-seed funding

PROVIDENCE – Light Frame, a new financial technology company with an international reach and Ocean State headquarters, has closed its pre-seed funding round with $1.7 million.

Launched in January, the company, led by CEO Schuyler Weiss, is developing an upgraded technology platform serving private banks and wealth managers.

Weiss grew up in Rhode Island but moved to Switzerland for his MBA, where he went on to establish the Swiss digital private bank Alpian in 2022. Alpian still operates today, but Weiss stepped down as the company’s CEO with the intention of improving current fintech resources for banks and returning to his home state.

Light Frame, headquartered in the CIC Providence, maintains Weiss’ Switzerland connection with an office in Lausanne. Weiss lives in East Greenwich and works primarily from the Providence location.

Weiss’ team is developing the software to address technology that hasn’t caught up with modern banking needs, he said. Most glaringly, current banking technologies tend not to work in synergy, limit cost reduction capabilities, and lack intelligence capabilities.

In contrast, Weiss says that Light Frame’s software will automate and streamline banking systems while providing advanced intelligence software.

“Today’s technology doesn’t do much of anything,” Wiess said. “It’s mostly relying on the people, and what we want to do is give the client directly, very intelligent device, or we want to give the relationship manager or banker the tools to give intelligent advice to their clients.”

And under Light Frame ‘s model, “what we charge will be lower, but at the same time, the cost to operate the bank will go down,” Weiss said.

Austin, Texas-based ATX Venture Partners and Chicago’s New Stack Ventures led the pre-seed funding round, with additional contributions by Rogue Venture Partners, Half Court Ventures, Underdog Labs and Studio Alpha.

Of those funders, Rogue Venture Partners has an office in Rhode Island, with the fund’s co-founder and managing director Tom Sperry based in the Ocean State.

Light Frame did receive interest from other venture funding sources in Rhode Island, Weiss said, though timing didn’t work out for the company’s seed funding round. And on the whole, tech funding sources based within the Ocean State are limited.

Though tech leaders and companies in Rhode Island have long called attention to the area’s limited funding options, Weiss believes that the Ocean State is moving in the right direction with its tech sphere. And outside of financing options, he added, the state has resources such as RIHub to help entrepreneurs.

“I’m very proud to be doing this in Rhode Island, Weiss said. “Rhode Island has a huge potential to be a big hub for companies like this.

“It’s much easier to create this company in New York or Silicon Valley, or in Switzerland,” he continued, “but there are a lot of great things happening in Rhode Island, and I want … to make it a better ecosystem for companies to set up in Rhode Island.”

Jacquelyn Voghel is a PBN staff writer. You may reach her at Voghel@PBN.com.