IHS Markit, a world leader in critical information, analytics and solutions, today announced that its Information Mosaic business is launching a new corporate actions solution specifically designed to meet the needs of global investment banks. This innovative solution, IMActions for Investment Banking, manages the entire corporate actions lifecycle from announcement capture and validation to downstream processing.

“We’ve spent the past 24 months working with several of the world’s leading banks to develop this cutting-edge solution, which automates the complex problem of asset servicing in the trading environment,” said Paul Taylor, managing director of Information Mosaic for IHS Markit. “With existing clients integrating the solution into their investment banking technology ecosystems, our user community will enjoy all the mutualised cost benefits of a standardised solution, rather than individual institutions having to invest time and money in maintaining expensive legacy platforms.”

Traditionally, the investment banking industry has built its own solutions to address these complex asset servicing requirements. However, as a generation of these applications nears end-of-life, Information Mosaic has collaborated with its global user community to extend its established IMActions platform to service the specific needs of the investment banking market. 

“Historically, investment banks and broker dealers have found it challenging to systematically manage and automate the workflow between client and market-side positions due to the complexity of position keeping intrinsic to the products and services they offer,” Taylor said. “To address this challenge, IMActions for Investment Banking supports the real-time reconciliation of client and market-side positions associated with a corporate action event. This process enables the delivery of correct market-side instructions and the settlement of subsequent cash and stock transactions, removing many of the operational risks currently associated with asset servicing within the industry.”

IMActions has an established client base of leading universal banks and custodians. Many of these existing clients have large investment banking franchises, which will benefit from Information Mosaic’s multi-entity, single platform solution.

 Barings, one of the world's leading asset management firms, announced today that it served as a Joint Lead Arranger on a senior secured credit facility to support GTCR's acquisition of a majority stake in Simplifi Holdings Inc. ("Simpli.fi").

Simpli.fi, headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, provides a programmatic platform that enables the largest buyers of localized advertising, including local media groups and agencies, to execute hyper-targeted campaigns across a variety of digital formats and devices.

"GTCR is pleased to have the support of Barings on our investment in Simpli.fi," said Jeff Heh, principal for GTCR. "Speed of execution and the ability to provide certainty of closing were essential requirements in this transaction, and Barings has proved to be a valuable partner to GTCR."

"Barings is excited to have this opportunity to partner with GTCR and to support the growth of Simpli.fi," said Sunny Khorana, a managing director in Barings' North American Private Finance Group. "Simpli.fi's digital advertising platform provides granular insights which have attracted a loyal customer base, and we believe the company's prospects are compelling as it teams with GTCR to drive growth and build enterprise value."

With over 600 investment professionals, including more than 70 dedicated solely to private finance, Barings leverages its global presence and local expertise to source private credit investments in developed markets worldwide. This global sourcing network, coupled with a diverse portfolio of platform companies, provides Barings with ongoing opportunities to finance middle market transactions including new platform investments, add-on acquisitions and recapitalizations across the U.S., Europe and Asia.

IW Capital leads milestone investment for the world’s first peer-to-peer currency exchange platform

• Mayfair based private equity firm IW Capital serves as the company’s lead and primary investor
• Series B will enable the company’s expansion into the Asian market, in addition to a host of new products including a corporate offering for 2018
• Defining WeSwap’s impressive rise to prominence is c.£100m in currency exchanged since its launch in 2015 with a 120% increase from 2016 figures
• The travel money and financial services disruptor services 300,000 users across Europe from its North London HQ
• Today’s series B round follows the company’s landmark crowdfunding campaign - the largest ever in the UK - formed of 3,500 investors, all of whom are users of the WeSwap platform
• With a five-star rating on Trust Pilot, the platform eradicates the requirement for middle-man facilitators, allowing travellers to swap currency directly at the interbank rate with no hidden fees 
• Recent launches include a next-day cash delivery service and a unique “borrow as you spend” credit offering  

Mayfair based private equity firm IW Capital has today announced the launch of its series B investment round for one of the UK’s leading fintech scale-ups -WeSwap. Having displayed exponential revenue growth of 116% in the last year alone, the series B round will serve as the primary driver in continuing WeSwap’s seismic growth thus far. Equipped with an impressive arsenal of global industry firsts, today’s launch follows the company’s landmark crowdfunding drive that saw the largest subscription uptake - formed of 3,500 investors - for any UK crowdfunding campaign; all of whom are users of the platform.  
 
Having delivered consistently impressive metrics since its inception, WeSwap’s 30+ travel industry partnerships, API integration, and a growing hotbed of travel-money products, firmly secures its position as one of the UK’s leading innovators in foreign exchange. Today’s series B announcement follows a spectacular summer of product roll-outs for the company, with recent launches including a next-day cash delivery service that has proved hugely popular - over £5 million already ordered - and a unique credit offering that is held at 0% for the first 30 days, allowing users to borrow as they spend.
 
Series B: plans for progression
 
As WeSwap nears the end of 2017, further product features include a savings functionality, international money transfer, and the ability to spend in all currencies. Moreover, once secured, the £8m raised will contribute towards the launch of WeSwap’s corporate travel product, with discussions currently in place with a number of corporate venture capital partners in the travel industry. The WeSwap for Business proposition is a unique service that enables companies to load money onto a WeSwap card so their employees can receive existent user benefits for all corporate travel. With a progression path that expands the company’s proposition into the Asian market, WeSwap is firmly positioned as the definitive solution for efficient money management for all consumer and corporate travel - globally. Additional features planned for the end of the year and early 2018 include:
 
 - A budgeting tool to help users plan their travel spending
 - A rate tracker to allow users to track exchange rate fluctuations
 - A “smart swap” feature that aids users in exchanging when the rates are strongest
 - A new app UX rollout
 - The ability to transfer and send money to friends and family
 
IW Capital adopts a sector agnostic approach to equity and debt investments, with an impressive portfolio that includes WeSwap, Brewhouse & Kitchen, Hill and Friends, Discovery Yachts, Inglenook Inns and Ubamarket. Utilising EIS, debt and private investment, the firm specialises in series A and B finance for high-growth SMEs that span the UK’s bustling private sector. Serving as testament to IW Capital’s robust collective of high-growth opportunities, WeSwap’s investment path and subsequent growth trajectory thus far are an indicative reflection of the UK’s benchmark fintech and alternative finance profile.
 
Jared Jesner, CEO and Founder of WeSwap commented:   
 
“This is a really exciting time for the business, from launching a suite of brand-new products to growing the offer for business travellers. We’ve utilised a series of debt, equity and private investment routes to achieve some great milestones that we’re really proud of, today’s launch marks a significant shift in our growth plans. We want WeSwap to be funding the world’s travel adventures and our expansion into new markets such as Asia, the US and Australasia is a big focus in ensuring this happens”
 
Luke Davis, CEO of IW Capital said:

“WeSwap is an excellent example, not only of the benchmark innovation the UK’s fintech sector has to offer, but also of how a strategic combination of debt, equity and private investment - when timed efficiently - can result in a truly outstanding SME growth story. We’re proud to have supported WeSwap from the very beginning, and I am very excited to see the plans post the series B raise come into fruition across the next year” 

IHS Markit (Nasdaq: INFO), a world leader in critical information, analytics and solutions, today announced that its Information Mosaic business is launching a new corporate actions solution specifically designed to meet the needs of global investment banks. This innovative solution, IMActions for Investment Banking, manages the entire corporate actions lifecycle from announcement capture and validation to downstream processing.

“We’ve spent the past 24 months working with several of the world’s leading banks to develop this cutting-edge solution, which automates the complex problem of asset servicing in the trading environment,” said Paul Taylor, managing director of Information Mosaic for IHS Markit. “With existing clients integrating the solution into their investment banking technology ecosystems, our user community will enjoy all the mutualised cost benefits of a standardised solution, rather than individual institutions having to invest time and money in maintaining expensive legacy platforms.”

Traditionally, the investment banking industry has built its own solutions to address these complex asset servicing requirements. However, as a generation of these applications nears end-of-life, Information Mosaic has collaborated with its global user community to extend its established IMActions platform to service the specific needs of the investment banking market. 

“Historically, investment banks and broker dealers have found it challenging to systematically manage and automate the workflow between client and market-side positions due to the complexity of position keeping intrinsic to the products and services they offer,” Taylor said. “To address this challenge, IMActions for Investment Banking supports the real-time reconciliation of client and market-side positions associated with a corporate action event. This process enables the delivery of correct market-side instructions and the settlement of subsequent cash and stock transactions, removing many of the operational risks currently associated with asset servicing within the industry.”

INTERXION HOLDING NV (NYSE: INXN), a leading European provider of carrier and cloud-neutral data centre services, today announced that it is working with global institutional agency-model broker INSTINET to host the firm’s MTF, BlockMatch.

Building on their long-standing relationship, Instinet will locate the matching engine of its proprietary BlockMatch^® multilateral trading facility (MTF) into Interxion’s London data centre campus. Using BlockMatch^®, Instinet’s clients will be able to trade on its matching platform with fair and equal access through Interxion’s cross-connect parity solution.  This offers market participants equal connectivity and consistent speed when trading; an important step in preparing for MiFID II.

Under the hosting arrangement, all BlockMatch participants connecting to the trading platform from a proximity hosting location within the Interxion campus will receive equalised cross-connects with a set distance of 250m, eradicating any material latency differences between users. Interxion will also provide Instinet with redundant GPS, Glonass and Galileo time synchronisation signals to enable BlockMatch^® to use highly accurate clocks to meet its MiFID II microsecond precision timestamping obligations. 

Ben Stephens, head of business development at Instinet Europe, said: “Locating the BlockMatch matching engine at Interxion’s London campus will ensure all participants will have the same advantages, this includes fair equalised access, speed of trading and high precision timestamps. As more trading moves to MTFs and the regulatory framework surrounding trading venues becomes more complex following MiFID II, having key elements of performance and compliance built into our data centre operations is the right thing to do both for us and for our clients.”

MiFID II is poised to become the gold standard for trading and market oversight in financial services, demanding firms make major changes to the way they operate, as well as the technology and connectivity infrastructures they depend upon. Accurate timestamping and systems resilience have to be built into a trading venue’s systems. To meet their new regulatory requirements before January 2018, trading venue operators like Instinet also need to be able to demonstrate equal market access, meaning they must provide the same latency for any client that uses a proximity hosting service or colocation cross-connect to access their matching engines. 

Commenting on the new arrangement, Bill Fenick, Interxion’s Strategy and Marketing Director for Financial Services, added: “MiFID II places a clear obligation on institutional clients to demonstrate best execution and on venue operators to ensure that there is no discrimination between participants. Fair and equal market access is essential. As a global leader in equity trading, Instinet’s commitment to not just meeting, but exceeding compliance requirements is exemplary. Working in our data centres, Instinet can give its clients confidence that they’re trading on an even playing field”.

Access to BlockMatch^® from Interxion’s London Campus will become available to all participants later in Q4 2017, ahead of the MiFID II implementation on 3 January 2018. BlockMatch^® will continue to operate in its current capacity until the move to Interxion.

Building on the success of its first machine learning project, Xero announced the next step in its journey towards code-free accounting – the automation of account codes and bills for all small businesses and their partners. 

With more than 500,000 bills entered into Xero every day, and each line of a bill edited individually, the automation of billing account codes is set to transform accounting practices, ensuring greater accuracy and reducing the time small businesses spend creating bills.

While bills is the second-most commonly used feature of Xero, it has the second-highest rate of defaults, with every small business using the system differently.  Fifty percent of businesses use 10 or more expense codes, while others create their own codes, which means that information is often entered incorrectly.  Xero’s new artificial intelligence system will consider each individual business’s characteristics, then recommend account codes based on what it has learned.

“We set out to further develop our machine learning programme to reduce the number of mistakes being made when creating bills. In doing so, we’ve created a system that not only learns from the individual needs of our customers, but can also make objective decisions about which account their transactions should be coded to,” said Andy Neale, Head of Data Science and Automation at Xero. 

With accuracy at the forefront of Xero’s latest development, the account code automation is rolling out to all Xero users, with customers continuing to code their accounts for bills as normal. A minimum of 150 bills is required to be entered and as more bills are entered and accepted or corrected, the better the suggestions become.

“Account coding has the potential to impact both small business finances and reporting. So, when applying machine learning to Xero’s billing system, we needed to ensure accuracy was at the forefront of any changes we were making. While we’ll only know the true impact of the technology when people start using it, on average, we know we can achieve more than 75 percent accuracy after 150 bills have been entered.”

“Account codes can be time intensive task for small businesses. We are using machine learning to simplify the system overall, so that more time is spent growing the business, rather than on low-value, administrative tasks,” Neale said.

 Workday, Inc. (NASDAQ: WDAY), a leader in enterprise cloud applications for finance and human resources, today announced the general availability of Workday Data-as-a-Service (DaaS), a cloud service that provides valuable data to customers to enable more informed decision-making. The first service delivered on the DaaS offering, Workday Benchmarking, provides key metrics to customers seeking a better understanding of their company’s relative performance in comparison to peers to help achieve optimal performance in their respective markets.

With Workday Benchmarking, customers worldwide can leverage the collective power of Workday’s extensive community – including over 26 million workers across more than 1,800 global organisations. Workday Benchmarking is seamlessly unified with all of Workday’s products, including Workday Financial Management, Workday Human Capital Management (HCM), Workday Planning, and Workday Prism Analytics, empowering customers with the only cloud system to plan, execute, and analyse their business through one secure environment.

Up-to-date Benchmarks, Analytics, and Insights to Improve Performance

Traditional benchmarking services and reports typically provide outdated data delivered out of context in silos. These services are not only costly, but difficult to manage due to their lack of flexibility around rules and calculations. Workday Benchmarking extends the analytical power of Workday and addresses these challenges by enabling customers to better understand their individual organisation’s relative performance using current, reliable data. Once customers elect to participate in the Workday Benchmarking service and select what data to contribute, their data is de-identified and added to a secure, aggregated dataset. In return, they get access to benchmarks representative of Workday’s participating customer community and can see how they compare against peers with similar demographics such as industry or company size. Benchmarks are surfaced right in the Workday applications and dashboards that business leaders access most, so they are empowered to make informed decisions on what actions to take to improve their company’s competitive position—all without ever having to leave Workday.

With Workday Benchmarking, customers have ready access to a growing catalogue of benchmarks, including:

• Workforce Composition Benchmarks (Age, Diversity, Tenure, and more) – For example, HR leaders at a technology company could compare the percentage of males and females in their workforce with similar organisations to gauge how well they are tracking against diversity goals.
• Turnover and Career Retention Benchmarks (Talent, Turnover, and others) – For example, a talent professional in healthcare noticing an increase in attrition can see if his company’s voluntary turnover is higher than that of industry competitors, which may indicate a retention issue.
• Leadership and Manager Effectiveness Benchmarks (Span of Control and Leadership) – For instance, a chief accounting officer at a financial institution concerned that her people managers may be overwhelmed can compare span of control with managers across the industry to identify which teams may need more support. 
• Workday Usage Benchmarks (System Utilization, Business Process, and others) – For example, an HR information systems executive in retail can find out if business processes are being completed faster or slower than peer organisations, to help determine if he should reconfigure business process definitions for greater efficiency.
• Financial Management Benchmarks – In future releases, benchmarks including core revenue growth and return on invested capital will be available to help customers better connect workforce metrics to financial success and strategic business goals. For example, a CFO at a professional services firm could compare revenue per employee against similar companies, then model against project staffing needs to ensure optimal staffing that delivers on billability while balancing costs. 

Like the entire Workday suite of applications, Workday Benchmarking leverages the power of one - one version of software, a single source of truth, one customer community, and a single security model and user experience – enabling customers to benefit from:

• Current and Reliable Data – Live, transactional data ensures aggregation that is consistent, accurate, and highly relevant, greatly reducing the time customers typically need to wait for access to benchmarks and calculations they can trust.  
• Benchmarks in Context – Benchmarks can be configured to surface in the context of where customers most frequently interact with Workday. For example, a business leader can view a dashboard benchmarking their company’s actual performance against peers, and then quickly take action all in a single system. 
• Built-in Security and Privacy – Workday Benchmarking relies on the highest privacy and security standards. All data contributed to Workday Benchmarking is de-identified and aggregated with similar data from a variety of sources prior to reporting. 
• Distribution and Governance – Like all analytics in Workday, benchmarking data can be secured to a domain and shared with anyone in the organisation, allowing insights to reach the people who need them without compromising control over individual permissions.
• Flexibility – As calculations evolve, peer groups change, and metrics are added, Workday’s cloud architecture makes it possible for Workday Benchmarking to quickly adapt and immediately deliver new metrics to customers.

“Data is the new currency, and Workday Benchmarking demonstrates how we continually deliver the analytical capabilities that enable our customers worldwide to unlock even more insights from their data and the broader Workday community,” said Joe Korngiebel, chief technology officer, Workday. “With Workday Benchmarking, our customers can tap into up-to-date, reliable data that gives an industry-wide view of how their individual business is performing compared to others, better equipping them to prioritise business initiatives, pick up new best practices, and strategically allocate resources in an instant.”

Cordium, the market-leading provider of governance, risk and compliance services, has expanded its Cybersecurity and Data Protection Consulting Services to the UK to help investment firms prepare for and manage the requirements of the EU’s new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which comes into effect in May 2018.

GDPR will introduce a rigorous set of data privacy and security requirements – spanning 99 articles and 173 recitals – for any organization that services European clients, regardless of where the company is located. The costs of non-compliance will be severe, with fines of up to €20 million or 4 per cent of annual turnover.

Cordium will help investment firms assess their current policies and practices for processing, storing and protecting data, identify any potential gaps to the GDPR requirements and develop remediation plans. Clients will receive recommendations on the tools they can deploy and the policies and procedures they can implement to ensure ongoing compliance.

Michael Corcione, Managing Director, Cybersecurity and Data Protection Consulting Services at Cordium said: “Any investment firm doing business in Europe and having EU citizen data is going to have to comply with GDPR. With continuing highly publicized cyber breaches, data security is now mission critical. The costs of getting it wrong will be punitive. This new regulation provides a detailed mandate, and any investment manager that treats GDPR compliance as a broader cybersecurity requirement will stand to benefit from tighter data controls and operations. We can support our clients with the specialized expertise and tools needed to secure their data and comply with the highest regulatory standards.”

The GDPR consulting service is the latest addition to Cordium’s growing set of Cybersecurity and Data Protection Services, first launched last year in the US. The Company’s services are designed to help investment firms quickly understand how GDPR and other regulatory requirements apply to their specific situations and how to embark on rapid and effective plans of action.

Deutsche Apotheker- und Ärztebank (apoBank) has appointed Avaloq to take its digitalisation to the next level. The Avaloq Banking Suite offers all benefits of an innovative, yet market-proven solution for apoBank to consequently execute its digital strategy. Avaloq’s involvement will expand the bank’s product offering and enhance the digital client experience.

apoBank’s decision follows an initial evaluation period and pre-project with Avaloq which commenced in September 2016. Following this successful pre-project, apoBank made the strategic decision to partner with Avaloq and implement the well-established Avaloq Banking Suite, Avaloq’s digital and core banking software. Avaloq’s proven track-record and ability to support banks in shaping and executing their digital strategy, as well as the software’s comprehensive functional range, were decisive factors in the bank’s decision-making process.

apoBank has a clear growth strategy based on extending its product offering and enhancing the digital client experience. Avaloq will play a critical role in executing the bank’s digital strategy, and its technology will also lead to increased operational efficiency. Avaloq’s solution is flexible and scalable, two key factors to build the IT setup of apoBank on a future-proof foundation. apoBank and its clients will thus benefit from a reduced time to market for innovative products. Furthermore, the Avaloq solution will comply with all regional regulations and the specific IT requirements of the European Central Bank (ECB).

The implementation of the Avaloq Banking Suite at apoBank will be carried out jointly by DXC Technology, Orbium and Avaloq. The project starts immediately, while Avaloq is continuously extending its resources, including the teams which already cooperated in the successful pre-project.

“Becoming the partner of choice for apoBank, which is renowned for serving medical professions, fills us with pride and is testament to the strength, quality and effectiveness of our digital solution for retail and corporate banking”, said Jürg Hunziker, Deputy Group CEO and Group Chief Markets Officer, at Avaloq. “We are delighted to welcome apoBank to the Avaloq Community. We will build on the momentum we have gained with this new partnership to further increase our footprint and build our position in Germany and the European Union”, Jürg Hunziker continues.

“This project is a lighthouse project for DXC in the banking sector. It proves our capabilities to lead digital transformations and confirms our position as one of the main IT provider for Banking in North and Central Europe. apoBank will benefit from our leading-edge capabilities in advisory, applications, security, cloud, and workplace combined with our industry-specific banking know-how. We are looking forward to continue working with apoBank”, said Michael Eberhardt, Vice President & General Manager North & Central Europe for DXC Technology.

"As an Avaloq premium implementation partner, we are thrilled to support apoBank with this initiative. With our blend of strategic business and systems implementation consulting, we will help apoBank stay ahead," said Roger Frei, Partner at Orbium. “We are looking forward to joining forces with Avaloq to deliver a leading digital solution for the German market and build on our international presence.”