Queensland-based Infocus Money Management (Infocus) is set to grow substantially within the next 12 months as it adds new offices and recruits more staff.
Infocus managing director Darren Steinhardt said the dealer group plans to increase financial planner numbers by 20 to 25 per cent.
"A lot of our offices are increasing adviser numbers now. Many business owners were reducing staff, but we're increasing," Steinhardt said.
Two new offices are soon to open in Tasmania and Infocus will also look to target Victoria and New South Wales.
"We are well established in Queensland and Western Australia, but we will start looking at other states where we haven't had as much of a presence," Infocus head of wealth management Matthew Zschech said.
According to Steinhardt, the group plans to establish up to 15 offices.
"We'll grow more by recruiting individual offices, so there will be increases in staff. But we will be recruiting as well," Steinhardt said.
The National Australia Bank (NAB) will have a 25 per cent stake in Infocus once its acquisition of Aviva Australia Holdings' wealth management business, which formerly had a stake in the dealer group, is completed by the end of the year.
Zschech said Infocus was considering an affiliation plan with NAB and MLC's wealth management operation that would be similar to Hillross and AMP.
However, Steinhardt said it is too soon to comment on this.
"It's very early days and we haven't come to a decision about what we will do and what we won't do," Steinhardt said.
"We had purposely gone into a partnership with Aviva and now we are in a relationship with someone not of our choosing. We want to be in business with someone we want to be in business with and we are uncomfortable about having a business partner being thrust upon us."
Infocus has shown strong growth since its inception in 2004, when it had five offices and $400 million in funds under advice (FUA).
The dealer group now has 62 offices, 136 financial planners and $3.5 billion in FUA.
