"Soft" Turrets Protect Traders Against Unexpected Threat: The Flu
September 21, 2009
This year's swine flu scare has forced trading firms to take stock of their business continuity plans--and given trading turret providers the opportunity to tout their disaster recovery tools.
IPC Systems, a provider of portable turrets for traders, had a busy summer, said Bjorn von Sydow, vice president of customer solutions. The cause: Concerns over how the H1N1 swine flu virus could impact their customers.
Since May, the company has seen an increased amount of interest in its MAXaccess 1000, a "soft turret" that allows traders to replicate the turrets they normally occupy on the trading floor with the same functionality on their own laptop, using an Internet browser and a phone.
Usually, a company plans for the two traditional disaster recovery scenarios: "Code Orange," which translates to no access to the building, and "Code Red," the shutdown of the whole building and/or its computer system, explained von Sydow.
However, with swine flu, said von Sydow, a company needs to spread people out. "It's more of a mobility issue than a business continuity issue," he said. "A customer may be prepared for a BCP issue, but it doesn't mean they are very prepared for a scare like a pandemic virus." Thus far, several bulge-bracket investment banks and brokerages have selected the MAXaccess 1000 for disaster recovery, he noted, without disclosing their names.
British telecommunications giant and IPC competitor BT has also experienced an increased interest in its disaster recovery tools.
On the trading floor, BT developed a PC-based answer dubbed ITS Anywhere. This gives a trader the ability to log on anywhere and see their turret on the PC in the exact same way as it looks on their desktop, said Howard Boville, Head of Global Banking, Payments, Radianz & Trading Systems. One BT client, Scotia Capital, implemented a disaster continuity plan after the SARS virus hit Toronto several years ago.
However, the availability of these tools that allow traders to work remotely doesn't necessarily mean traders should be expecting their bosses to allow them to work from home everyday anytime soon.
"The reason why people choose the soft turrets is not to replace the hard turret, but is mostly for mobility so people can access the trading floor from outside the building," von Sydow said.
While the Web-based soft turret is visually very close to what traders have on their desks at work, there are some restrictions. "You do have a limited number of speakers you can listen to, and only one handset instead of the usual two," he said. "It's nothing I would say the user would replace and use instead of the hard turret."
