Platform Computing, a provider of cluster, grid and cloud management software has been tapped by UniCredit Global Information Systems S.p.A. (UGIS) to create a global, virtualized high-performance shared computing infrastructure for its global Markets & Investment Banking and Risk Management applications to lower their costs and increase server utilization.

UniCredit is a major European financial institution.  To support increasing workloads on their underutilized computing infrastructure, UGIS selected Platform Symphony and core components of Platform ISF to create a dynamic grid-computing platform across its datacenters.  This new shared computing platform will add processing power to key applications while reducing the cost by tapping previously underutilized computing resources.  The solution combines the performance of grid computing with the flexibility of virtualization for more elastic application workload support.  The result is reduced energy and data center costs and less hardware and software capital expenses, while increasing underutilized server resources. As of November 2010, this combination of technology has been moved to production for the Full Revaluation Engine system (FRE) leveraging Platform Symphony API. FRE is used for the Internal Market Risk system.  UGIS Global Markets & Treasury is using Platform Computing to support its growth across multiple business units.  The shared IT infrastructure is used to support major pricing and risk applications as well as testing and end-user acceptance development.  Platform Computing replaces several homegrown solutions built around various middleware solutions to provide better dynamic resource sharing across the datacenter.  UGIS Global Markets & Treasury is now able to dynamically provision physical and virtual resources and allocate workloads to existing virtual image containers based on utilization thresholds. The shared compute infrastructure is used for pricing purposes from Murex Fixed Income and Interest Rate Derivatives, Murex FX Options, Murex Credit Derivatives and for the Market Risk and will be extended in the coming months to other front office applications such as Sophis for Equity Derivatives. The new Credit Counterparty Risk application will also be based on the Platform Symphony solution.  "The traditional approach to IT is not working as the current model of building silos does not meet the dynamic needs of an organization in a competitive and fast-moving sector, such as Financial Services," said Christopher Nathan, Vice President EMEA, Platform Computing. "Enterprise grid computing offers organizations like UGIS Global Markets & Treasury a responsive, cost-effective IT model that delivers critical resources and added value."  (Contact: Platform Computing, 877/528-3676, www.platform.com.)

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The PCI Security Standards Council announced the latest slate of special interest groups that it will prioritize next year.

Merchants, financial institutions, service providers and others voted on a variety of potential SIGs before settling on cloud, e-commerce security and risk assessment.  This is the first time SIG selection was put to a vote, and more than 500 were cast, close to a quarter of the SSC’s participating organizations, said Jeremy King, European director of the PCI SSC, who added that one-third of the votes cast came from outside North America.  PCI SIGs are essentially forums for feedback on topics that ultimately is turned into guidance for interpreting and implementing existing or new mandates to the standard, the SSC said in a release. This year, the SSC released guidance on tokenization, point-to-point encryption and virtualization. SIGs are made up of merchants, payment processors and qualified security assessors. SIGs must complete their efforts and deliver a guidance document within one year. This year, voters had seven potential SIGs to choose from, and were asked to select a top three. The seven, according to the Storefront BackTalk blog, were: administrative access to systems and devices; how to write a risk assessment; patch management; e-commerce guidelines; PCI in the cloud; small business and PCI; and managing hosted service providers. (Contact: PCI Security Standards Council, LLC, 781/876-8855, https://www.pcisecuritystandards.org).

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Texas-based Fisoc has developed a web centric platform called BuzzBanking that enables credit unions, community and independent banks to offer rewards that benefit both their customers and merchants enrolled in the program and just in time for holiday shopping. "Developing and delivering a web-centric banking platform that meets all of the technical, financial, security and regulatory requirements is a tremendous undertaking, but we had confidence in the Fisoc executive team due to their experience in both the banking and social media market segments," noted Scott Helbig of Daylight Partners. "By offering this rewards program, community banks and credit unions can gain new customers and increase the loyalty of existing customers, while merchants enrolled in the program can attract new business. Perhaps most importantly, the customer, both the bank's and the merchant's, receives benefits that weren't available prior to the introduction of the program and the customer experience is greatly enhanced." Fisoc has a number of financial institutions across the state of Texas ranging from Texarkana to Lubbock that are already using the company's rewards platform and is timely for Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. Fisoc is continuing to roll out the program on a statewide basis. "We are leveraging our team of experts in both Internet banking and social media to provide the industry's most highly integrated and secure platform for rewards points being offered to credit unions, community and independent banks; programs that were generally available only from big banks," said Jay Valanju, CEO of Fisoc. "Consumer spending is at its peak during the holiday shopping season and these banks now have an option to offer rewards points to their customers for their spending and extra points and for sharing BuzzBanking with their friends."  According to recent articles in the Wall Street Journal and New York Times, thousands of customers, complaining of rising fees flooded into credit unions and small banks on Bank Transfer Day. These developments have exponentially increased the number of potential consumers and demand for Fisoc's products and services from financial institutions.  (Contact: Fisoc, 877/577-BUZZ, www.buzzbanking.com.)

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IPC Systems Inc. last week announced the formal debut of Connexus, its financial extranet service for facilitating trading lifecycle communications.

 Connexus helps capital market participants gain quick and cost-effective access to a broad range of cloud-based trade lifecycle services through a single connection.  Connexus is specifically designed to meet the evolving requirements of capital markets firms for increased flexibility and responsiveness, bringing speed, simplicity, expertise and cost advantages to buy side firms, sell side firms, inter-dealer brokers, liquidity venues, clearing and settlement firms as well as application and market data providers. For application providers such as OMS/EMS vendors, order routing specialists, market data vendors, FX platforms, exchanges, electronic communication networks (ECN) and clearing firms, Connexus delivers guaranteed service performance for their customers to access and use their trade lifecycle applications.  Connexus also meets the challenges associated with electronic trading by enabling participants to avoid costly infrastructure investments while increasing speed-to-market and allowing faster reaction to customer requests. These benefits can help participants to maximize both network performance and opportunities in developed and emerging markets. “The development of Connexus drew upon our nearly 40 years of experience and sole focus in capital markets,” said Michael Speranza, senior vice president, Product Management, IPC. “Connexus customers can leverage fast service activation for sending and receiving critical trade and market data within the trading community, allowing them to serve their customers better, complete deals faster and compete more successfully.”  (Contact: IPC Systems, 213/975-9575, www.ipc.com.)

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