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FinTech Trends Newsletter Week 15th Jan – 19th Jan 2018
Five Tips for Improving Fund Operations & Reducing Costs
With the start of 2018 well and truly underway, many firms are setting and finalising their budgets and looking for opportunities to run more efficiently. Technology is one area where savvy alternative investment firms can optimise their budgets to make room for new IT initiatives and technologies.
Here’s our list of five technology budget areas to evaluate:
Cloud Technology
*Go Cloud; If you’re still running an on-premise IT environment it is time to evaluate a move to the cloud. Aside from shifting IT management responsibilities, you’ll gain access to cost predictability and the latest technology feature sets. Not to mention the real estate footprint benefit – going cloud will increase your floor space and reduce your power and cooling expenses as well as your hardware & software costs.
*Hybrid Cloud; If you’re already in the cloud, it may be time to consider seeing what a Hybrid Cloud offering can deliver in terms of cost-savings. Note, if control, security and privacy are your top priorities, you may want to stick with a Private Cloud.
Purchasing
*Think ahead; Purchase multi-year software licenses, and you can usually get a discount. You should also buy hardware in bulk. Even if you don’t need a dozen PCs or printers, you will end up paying more out-of-pocket if you order at the last minute.
*Be resourceful. Take advantage of vendor relationships. Buy in bulk, when possible, and ask about rebates and/or special incentives that could reduce costs. You can also inquire about blanket discounts. You might be able to make an arrangement in which all purchases within a certain timeframe are locked in at standard prices.
*Evaluate. Take a close look at your internal requirements and whether you need all the functionality that each service and product offers. In most cases, your service provider can give you a standard package, and upgrades can always be made at a later time.
Telecommunications
*Just ask. It can’t hurt to ask your telecommunications provider or MSP if there are any ways to reduce costs. Of course, they want your business, but, Like Storm IT Financial, we also want you to remain a valued and satisfied customer. So we will often go out of their way to help you lower your telecom bill if you ask them to. We at Storm, will proactively try to condense, reduce and simplify your telecoms costs.
Disaster Recovery & Data Protection
*Take a Hybrid Approach. While we don’t recommend that a firm operate without data protection and backup in place, it is possible for firms to take a phased approach with their disaster recovery deployment especially with the advent of Hybrid DR Solutions (think Storm IT Financial). With Hybrid DR, you can protect high-performance/availability applications in a Public Cloud environment while putting less critical applications in an on premise environment.
Market Data
*Evaluate again. Firms can pay thousands/month/per user for access to market data, which makes perfect sense if an employee requires the functionality. However, some employees only require parsed down features and functionality, which can present a cost savings. Evaluate the alignment of an employee’s job function with their technology needs and purchase accordingly.
For further advice and assistance in ways you can increase efficiency and reduce costs at your firm – without sacrificing performance and to learn more about cloud benefits, disaster recovery, data management and managed solutions, Contact Storm IT Financial.
Storm IT Financial FinTech News & Trends picks: Week 15th Jan – 19th Jan 2018
Bloombergs “2018: A year of change for the buy side”
Bloombergs Global Outlook:
https://spotlight.bloomberg.com/story/5a1e84986fd6e534c7c6a923
Goldman Sachs has led a $38m funding round into tech firm VisibleAlpha to help battle Mifid II challenges
A startup which aims to help analysts and fund managers cope with dreaded regulatory changes has grabbed $38m (£27m) of funding today, from a cohort of big banks led by Goldman Sachs:
http://www.cityam.com/279045/goldman-sachs-has-led-38m-funding-round-into-tech-firm
BBH (Brown Brothers Harriman): Regulating Cryptocurrencies
An examination of uncharted legal waters with Cryptocurrency
Technology:
JPMorgan Chase Competitive Strategy Teardown: How The Bank StacksUp On Fintech & Innovation
Among bulge bracket banks, JPMorgan is making a bigger push into pay- ments technology as digital banking becomes a strategic priority:
Cryptocurrency the main target for scammers in 2018
A new year brings new opportunities and, for investment scammers, 2018 seems set to deliver new ways to defraud investors of their cash….:
GDPR: 5 Quick Facts For Fund Managers
The already intricated regulatory landscape for fund managers will see more added complexity with General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR):
https://www.alpha-week.com/gdpr-5-quick-facts-fund-managers
Microsoft buys Avere to boost its hybrid cloud strategy; start-up counted Google among investors
Microsoft announced that it has acquired Avere Systems, a start-up specialising in data storage:
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/03/microsoft-acquires-avere-systems.html
83% Of Enterprise Workloads Will Be In The Cloud By2020
Survey is predicting that 41% of enterprise workloads will be run on public cloud platforms by 2020:
Northern Trust Acquires Omnium, Citadel’s HedgeFund Administrator
Omnium will operate as Northern Trust Hedge Fund
Services:
Bono’s VC firm is said to make its first fintech investment
FinTech startups are grabbing a greater share of capital from investors. Now Bono is getting in on the action:
Banks shift priorities toward growth, digitisation and innovation – survey
More than half of global banks expect to see their tech- nology investment budgets rise by over 10% this year:
IT Security Spending to Reach $96 Billion in 2018
Identity access management (IAM) and security services to drive worldwide spending growth:
