Guideline offers a fully integrated, automated platform that handles plan administration, employee onboarding, compliance testing, government filing and recordkeeping for small- and medium-sized businesses. The company provides traditional 401(k) plans and supports self-employed individuals through SEP IRAs, with a broad menu of self-service options for employers and employees. Guideline’s technology-driven approach automates processes and aims to remove hidden fees and complexity that make retirement plans cost prohibitive for many SMBs. The company says more than 20,000 companies — representing hundreds of thousands of participants — use its platform, with over $4.5 billion in assets under management. Guideline plans to use the new funding to further scale its full-service 401(k) offering and to introduce additional retirement plan solution products. The company was founded in 2015 and is based in San Mateo, California. Guideline provides an automated 401(k) platform that handles administration, record-keeping, and investment management to simplify retirement plans for small businesses and startups. The company targets SMBs that historically have low 401(k) adoption, offering pricing and workflows tailored for that market. As of late October, Guideline reported over $3 billion in assets under management, serving roughly 15,000 small-business plans and 255,000 individual investors on its platform. In July Guideline announced an $85 million Series D co-led by Generation Investment Management and Greyhound Capital. American Express Ventures also participated in the financing and has closed its investment, saying it may explore commercial partnerships with Guideline. Guideline has secured distribution deals such as an exclusive 401(k) partnership and a deep QuickBooks integration with Intuit to broaden SMB reach. Guideline, founded in 2015, offers a SaaS-based 401(k) platform that makes it easier for SMBs to provide retirement plans and for employees to enroll and manage accounts. The product charges a small $500 setup fee and monthly fees based on participating employees rather than a percentage of assets under management. Guideline emphasizes higher employee participation through education, recommended plans based on age, salary and risk tolerance, and integrations with payroll providers including Gusto, OnPay, BambooHR and Xero. Since going live last summer the company has attracted nearly 2,000 employers and amassed more than $120 million in assets under management, with roughly 3,000 companies in its sales backlog. Guideline plans to expand its engineering and customer success teams to drive more partnerships and customer growth. Guideline provides an all-inclusive 401(k) technology platform that handles plan administration tasks including set-up, participant enrollment and education, recordkeeping, investment management, compliance, and reporting. The platform charges a single flat fee per participant. Led by CEO Kevin Busque, the company supports businesses with an end-to-end retirement plan solution. Guideline completed a $7M Series A financing to support its growth. The company intends to use the funds to continue to grow its proprietary platform and partnerships. Operations are based in San Francisco, CA. Guideline Technologies offers a streamlined 401(k) platform that cuts expensive actively managed funds and uses low-cost index funds (primarily Vanguard) to lower fees for plan participants. The company focuses on simplifying onboarding and user experience to boost employee participation in employer plans. Guideline is still in beta, working toward registration as an investment advisor, and currently employs three people besides founder Kevin Busque. It was founded four months before the article was published and is San Francisco–based; Busque previously co-founded TaskRabbit. Guideline has raised seed funding to expand its engineering team and build out distribution, including a database of small businesses derived from IRS data. The company plans to be paid directly by employers and says it will be transparent about its fees.

Total raised

$309M

Funding rounds

5

Latest round

Equity

Latest activity

Jun 2021