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Proximity: Stretching – Or Actually Shrinking the Cloud Model

March 1, 2012 By JhoanCheco 1 Comment

By Jhoan Checo, Sales Director, Financial Services Practice

If there is anything we can all agree on, it may be that the definition of “cloud computing” is anything but consistent. To be sure, the basics of application accessibility, operational flexibility, and cloud economics have become key components of the definition.  From there, various cloud deployment methodologies take different paths, each exploiting those key components that make cloud computing attractive on levels of cost efficiency, scalability and reliability.

So, a term that is fast achieving “buzzword” status, “proximity cloud”, adds another interesting dimension to basic cloud computing concepts.  While cloud computing is all about providing data access, software, applications, computation, and storage resources without knowing the location and other details of the computing infrastructure, proximity cloud adds a dimension that does recognize and leverage the computing and/or data location.

Importance of Proximity

Take the example of the financial services sector, a group that has become very cognizant of latency issues – the time delay inherent in a system. Contemporary high-frequency trading solutions executed with global exchanges now demand microsecond response times to execute trades, or risk being exposed to potentially millions of dollars in lost opportunity.  Financial institutions and liquidity centers gain performance by configuring cloud solutions that incorporate data centers and computing in close proximity to the exchanges they do business with.  The more response time can be minimized, the greater the performance opportunity not only in latency, but also bandwidth issues. Of course, not all industries are as demanding, but there will always be a continuing challenge to improve response time, whether its streaming media or healthcare, etc.

The closer a business can place its data and computer power – to its users and partners the better. With this in mind, FiberMedia Group for example, located their infrastructure service capabilities in close proximity to buy-side and sell-side firms, hedge funds, execution vendors, market data suppliers. network providers and trading technology suppliers.  A network of five data centers are positioned throughout New York metro, set to deliver secure, robust, ultra-low latency and redundant facilities for colocation, disaster recovery and business continuity. Further, each center is certified to stringent SAS70 Type2 audit standards, so clients can rest assured all processes and infrastructure are geared to supporting the highest levels of service and up-time requirements.

The FiberMedia team of industry-proven professionals is only a call away.  To tap into this knowledge-base visit www.fibermedia.net for a consultative experience that will help you transform your business.

Filed Under: Business Continuity, Cloud, Customer Advice, Data Center Industry Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Cloud Computing Services Within the FX Trading Environment: Are Early Adopter Tags Running Out?

February 3, 2012 By JhoanCheco Leave a Comment

By Jhoan Checho, Sales Director, Financial Services Practice, FiberMedia Group

It seems the “early adopter” tags are going fast when it comes to implementing cloud based services in many arenas. Meanwhile, everyone else maintaining a sideline stance needs to understand and appreciate the competitive advantage that goes with the strategic decision. Reality is – cloud services have been in play for some years now, and in some arenas, early adopters have charged forward with a wealth of business advantage. Howard Tolman, Managing Director at Cloud Trading Technologies Ltd. offered some thoughts in an article that appeared in eForex, January 2012, Mythbusters.

Common concerns include reliability, scalability and security

Mr. Tolman addressed some relevant concerns in his comments from the perspective of the FX trading environment. Leading the thought process are concerns for high availability and reliability, especially in mission critical trading systems. Technical reliability in the form of cloud computing mechanisms are largely regarded as more reliable than internal systems. There is redundancy built-in as well as the benefit of highly maintained hardware and software applications, which drive the holy grail of uptime.

The efficiencies open to institutions large or small is exactly what makes the agile premise so appealing. Cloud techniques benefit organizations of all sizes, and allow IT resources to focus on IT processing issues instead of server updates and the like. Scalability, to “massive” demand, is achieved through agile provisioning of virtual servers and storage. This methodology utilizes infrastructure resources based on real-time demand. Especially in the financial trading side where volumes are highly volatile, demand needs change rapidly. This makes the appeal of provisioning cloud services as demanded more efficient than owning, configuring and maintaining. Consider the value of paying only for what you use, as you use it…

Cloud security stirs ongoing discussion, though stringent standards have evolved to support an extremely strong level of protection. As Mr. Tolman pointed out, The United States Air Force has placed confidence in current capabilities, which should suffice for most organizations.

The loyalty of a trusted business partner, combined with the cost-savings of an outside vendor

Gartner analysts identified IT costs amassed in financial institutions run approximately 250% higher than non-banking institutions. With a gap that significant …there exists opportunity. Of course, cost-savings is a primary driver of cloud based implementations. No longer having to worry about constant server updates and other computing issues, your IT Team’s time is free to concentrate on your business’ continued innovation and growth. Perhaps one of the more interesting points made by Tolman comes in the fact that nearly one third of a financial institution’s staff is typically involved in IT. Imagine the benefit of having a larger percentage of an institution’s associates focused on core revenue producing activities… Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) solutions enable cost-effective cloud networking solutions that provide virtualized bandwidth, colocation, storage and back-up facilities, on-demand. Further, financial services institutions would do well to ensure that their partners in cloud computing can support their unique needs, delivering an efficient, flexible, cost-effective model. Options of dedicated/private or public hybrid clouds, aligned with access to market data providers, electronic news feeds and low latency performance are all features that can readily be configured and deployed in the name of significant competitive advantage.

FiberMedia knows that reliability, scalability, and security are the key foundations to delivering fully customizable, cloud based computing and on-demand storage solution options. The company also recognizes that budgets to manage all aspects of a business are being constrained. For 36-months, FiberMedia offers a guaranteed rate-lock for its services. This provides revenue assurance for companies as they are challenged with managing budgets to ensure business growth. With static costs in-tow, access to a competitive service provider landscape and proximity to the trading engines that propel your business, FiberMedia’s cloud computing service solutions can be the anchor you need to keep your business on the competitive edge.

Find out more by contacting saleshelp@fibermedia.net today.

Filed Under: Cloud, Data Centers, Financial Services Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Pressure for Improved Technology to Support the Financial Services Market is Here

January 30, 2012 By JhoanCheco Leave a Comment

by Jhoan Checho, Sales Director, Financial Services Practice, FiberMedia Group

An article written by Alison Crosthwait, managing director of Global Market Structure Research titled ‘Pockets of Opportunity in 2012’ caught my attention a couple of weeks ago.  She writes about the new trends facing traders today while also observing the development made over the past years that will create ‘pockets of opportunities,’ which she predicts, will create a competitively fierce market.

The seven global market structure trends cited in Crosthwait’s article are 1) consolidation, 2) The politicizing of regulation, 3) Execution Management Systems, 4) maturation of high frequency trading, 5) complex spread trading technology, 6) merger failures and resource constraints, 7) new market competition:  Australia, Brazil and Korea.

While consolidation has occurred, Crosthwait is quick to observe that trading volumes have not picked up as a result. An area of interest she explores is the cost of technology and regulatory compliance.  According to Crosthwait it has skyrocketed – but has it?

Yes there are greater capital requirements and the implementations to prepare for the Volcker Rule, a specific section of the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the technology changes required by companies will be expensive to implement.  But does it have to be?

Certainly there are network providers that are designing and constructing new dark fiber systems to support the strict requirements outlined by the Acts, but there are also new technologies that can be deployed that can keep costs manageable.  Let’s consider Cloud Computing as a manageable cost platform that financial companies can leverage.  Cloud Computing, though not necessarily the optimal infrastructure for complex or even simplex transactions, it can be a highly efficient way to connect to general day-to-day operation systems and could offer a varied and effective back-up system to a number of other type of transactions.  If Cloud Computing isn’t your ‘thing,’ consider the flexibility and dynamic capabilities of Ethernet switching.  But that’s just the network side of it all.

A network needs a good home – a place where it has the foundation to connect to information, reliable power sources and can be in a secure – sometimes even hidden – environment that protects and assures the uptime capabilities of the equipment it contains.  A company needs a data center that offers a unique infrastructure with redundant capabilities, scalable footprint that can be managed by a trusted team.  And proximity to other marketplace enablers like trading exchanges and market engines as well as data platforms is inherent to finding the right data center partner.

FiberMedia knows that reliability, scalability, and security are the key foundations of the right data center partner for the financial services industry. The company also knows that budgets to manage all aspects of a business are being constrained.  For 36-months, FiberMedia has guarantees a rate-lock for its services.  This provides revenue assurance for companies as they are challenged with managing budgets to ensure business growth.  With static costs in-tow, access to a competitive service provider landscape and proximity to the trading engines that propel your business, FiberMedia’s managed data center solutions can be the anchor you need to keep your business a float.

Find out more by contacting saleshelp@fibermedia.net today.

Originally posted on Broadband Nation.

Filed Under: Customer Advice, Data Centers, Financial Services Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Low Latency Solutions for 2012

January 19, 2012 By JhoanCheco Leave a Comment
by Jhoan Checo, Account Director, FiberMedia Group

There’s a lot of discussion out there about Low Latency in the Financial Services industry.  With 2012 just starting, we wanted to compile some predictions and observations shared in a variety of sources, related to the Financial Services industry.

One Size DOES NOT Fit All

The one size fits all mentality is a thing of the past.  Financial Service companies have a specific need for specialized feeds direct from exchanges.  There is a growing need in the market for improved latency for the more traditional and larger real time subscriber base of the financial services industry, where speed is important but other attributes that are antithetical to speed are valued such as tick integrity for pre-trade analytics and strategy back testing.  Those techniques are increasingly important to the trade cycle, book depth management, synthetic NBBO’s, risk obligations, and credible exchange models offering protection against high frequency strategies.

Since one size DOES NOT fit all, FiberMedia works with its clients to combine traditional capabilities with cutting-edge technology in order to support their specific needs.

Low Latency Solutions Still Have a Place

Financial Services Technology DealIt is proven that Low-Latency applications run more effectively with a one-source infrastructure support solution.  FiberMedia has partnered with Hudson Fiber Network (HFN), to provide high-bandwidth, low-latency networking solutions for the financial industry.  Last fall, HFN has extended its dark fiber network into FiberMedia’s Secaucus, New Jersey data center to ensure low latency connectivity is available.  This is important because ultra low latency for single digit microsecond performance will continue to be a core requirement for algorithmic traders, access to real-time market feeds and an array of other real-time financial trading applications that depend on speed to beat the market.

In 2012, trading firms recognize that they need optimized, high performance trading applications with low latency and ultra fast access to market liquidity and trading venues.  Reducing latency is crucial to gain visibility and manage the fluidity between IT supply and the ever-increasing industry demand.

2012 Is About Efficiency, Proximity, and Accessibility

FiberMedia is the one-source infrastructure support solution of choice for a growing list of buy-side and sell-side firms, hedge funds, execution venues, market data suppliers, network providers and trading technology suppliers. For starters, FiberMedia’s network of centers has been carefully located to provide clients like you with easy access to Wall Street, and all major financial markets and exchanges.  Combined with 100% carrier-neutral network connectivity in all our centers, this ensures your low-latency applications run more effectively.

HFN is just one of the examples of how FiberMedia serves the needs of the market.  Its 100% carrier-neutral network connectivity in all of their data centers ensures low-latency applications run effectively.

FiberMedia features the only network of five data centers throughout the New York Metro area that delivers secure, robust and redundant facilities for co-location, disaster recovery and business continuity.  Each center is certified to stringent SAS70 Type2 audit standards, so that you can rest assured all processes and infrastructure are geared to supporting the highest levels of service and uptime requirements.  Market data rates will continue to grow at an even faster rate in 2012.  Fortunately you don’t have to worry about rising costs.  With FiberMedia’s Three Year Rate Lock, you count on fixed rates, which should make you and your CFO very happy.  Contact me to discuss how FiberMedia can change the way you do business either by Email or call

Filed Under: Customer Advice, Data Center Industry, Data Centers Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

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