We’re incredibly proud to share today that Capitalize has been selected as one of TIME’s Best Inventions of 2021. We’re both honored and excited by the recognition.
When we started Capitalize, we never really thought of ourselves as “inventors”. We noticed the frustration that people felt when moving their retirement savings as they changed jobs, and we wanted to understand why. What we discovered was an old-school institutional process (the “rollover”!) that had never been modernized and a set of incentives that made fixing it low on the priority list for the incumbents. We were staggered by the consequences of this phenomenon: millions of 401(k) accounts left behind, almost $100 billion withdrawn prematurely each year, and over $1 trillion of assets sitting in forgotten 401(k)s tied to former employers.
So we set out to change that – with the customer’s best interests in mind, at all times. We built a free platform to help Americans at every stage of the rollover process so that they could consolidate their assets. Since launching in late September 2020, we’ve helped tens of thousands of Americans get their retirement savings back on track after using our free, easy-to-use platform. We’re incredibly grateful for their trust.
We’re also grateful for the trust of our partners. We aim to treat them as we do our customers: with honesty, dedication, and a commitment to building a long-term relationship.
We have a lot more work to do before we feel satisfied. There are millions of Americans who change jobs each year and leave their 401(k)s behind or cash them out – we’re excited to help more of them as we work to make our platform even better and easier to use.
We started Capitalize with the broader mission to help Americans save for retirement. We’re in the early innings of that journey and have much more to do. We’ve always known that the painful rollover process is a symptom of much deeper underlying problems in the modern retirement savings market – and we want to solve all of them. For now, though, we’re deeply gratified by the recognition of TIME and the trust of our customers. Onwards and upwards.
Gaurav Sharma
CEO & Co-Founder, Capitalize
