The advice software I wanted to use.

I spent five years working in two different advice firms. We tried the market leader, an adviser-made option and a much newer one. Each did something useful, but none made the work feel joined up. Client facts were entered more than once, calculations were checked in separate tools and the record of why a decision was made had to be reconstructed later.

When newer development tools made the idea practical, I had a real chance to build around the problem I knew firsthand. Aether started with one durable client record and a simple test: each new part should remove repeated work without hiding the judgement an adviser still has to make. It continues to consume my mornings and nights. I do have a day job, which is a fairly effective scope-control mechanism.