Svenska Handelsbanken Goes with Grid from Platform Computing
Svenska Handelsbanken, one of Sweden’s leading personal and corporate banking groups, has adopted Platform Symphony to power high-performance analytics with grid computing. Platform Symphony provides Svenska Handelsbanken with a single grid which delivers distributed compute capacity for multiple business-critical applications.
Svenska Handelsbanken initially engaged with Platform Computing in September 2009, as it sought to maximise hardware resources and improve data centre efficiency. Prior to the installation, the bank was building and maintaining its own internal system. Svenska Handelsbanken now has the flexibility to add new compute infrastructure and respond to hardware issues transparently. The deployment of Platform Symphony has increased hardware utilisation and is expected to reduce application development costs.
One of the functions of the grid is to run core applications for front office applications. The third party solution that provides these applications is SunGard’s Front Arena, a global capital markets solution that delivers position control across multiple asset classes and business lines. Many areas of the bank, including the equities division, use the applications. New risk regulations in Sweden require running more risk scenarios to support better risk management and planning, which in turn, require more compute power. The grid effectively delivers this through more effective resource pooling and workload management.
“The Swedish banking landscape is continually evolving and we are committed to providing first-class services to our customers and having the right technical infrastructure allows us to be more agile than our competitors,” said Peter Magnusson, head of systems development, trading systems, Svenska Handelsbanken. “After an evaluation process of the grid marketplace, we choose Platform Computing as a partner.”