Finura merges with Vokke to build sovereign AI for Australia's regulated industries
What's the deal? Australian holding company Finura GroupDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → has merged with Vokke, an ISO-certified software engineering and AI infrastructure firm. The all-brand merger creates a group of 28 people serving wealth management, defence, and manufacturing. Deal terms were not disclosed.
What do they do? Finura runs the Advice Designer software platform and WealthTech consultancy Finura ServicesDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →. Vokke, operating since 2015, brings its Navi AI agent platform and Vokke Cloud, a sovereign private cloud hosted in Melbourne.
What changes? Both companies keep their existing brands, teams, customers, and services. The engineers who built Advice Designer now sit inside the group alongside Vokke's infrastructure and AI capability.
Why now? Finura argues that sustainable AI adoption in regulated industries needs more than standalone tools built on general-purpose models. It frames the deal around three capabilities: domain knowledge, engineering, and secure onshore infrastructure that can be certified.
What's the endgame? Advice Designer is being rebuilt as a deterministic, compliance-aware platform that complements advisers' existing tools rather than replacing them. Vokke adds defence credentials, including ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 certifications, pending DISP certification, and active involvement in the LAND 400 capability program.
Who leads it? The four founders — Jon Wellman and Adrian Grayson-Widarsito of Vokke, and Peter Worn and Aron Satchell of Finura — become directors of Finura Group. Worn leads the combined group as executive chair; Wellman continues as Vokke CEO.
"Bringing that engineering inside the group means we can now build at the speed this market is moving, on infrastructure we own, in a country that increasingly cares about AI and data sovereignty," Worn said.
Wellman said the merged business would accelerate Vokke's AI products while keeping its identity. "As a combined business, we are stronger together," he said, adding that Vokke's certifications, defence work, and security posture "remain core to our proposition."
The signal: The merger reflects a push to keep AI for regulated sectors Australian-owned and onshore, combining consulting, engineering, and sovereign cloud in a single vendor. For advice firms wary of general-purpose AI, that bet on certifiable, data-sovereign infrastructure is becoming a competitive line.
Read more: finuragroup.com
Image credit: Generated with Gemini
