Investia, the UK-based provider of mutual fund processing solutions whose technology underpins the FundsHub distribution platform offered to mutual fund houses by JP Morgan, announced today that it had released an upgraded version of its Javelin technology. The company claims that it is the first application to free UK domestic mutual funds from manual intervention, from order entry and routing, through dealing and unit pricing, to clearing and settlement.
However, Investia Javelin version 2.4 continues to offer manual pricing and manual confirmation processes to support firms which either cannot handle complete automation or wish to retain manual processing as a back-up procedure. The latest version also includes a number of new features, including generic order flow routing capabilities, EMX routing implementation, equities product handling, cash handling improvements, and enhanced security and performance measures.
“Through a rules-based processing engine, Investia Javelin routes orders on a per-product basis,” explains Investia. “Using open standards and the rules-based processing server, Investia Javelin provides a robust, scaleable infrastructure to facilitate support for financial messaging protocols and data formats such as ISO15022 and FIX. ” Specifically, Investia Javelin is able to route fund orders through the UK market’s EMX hub in an automated fashion. It is also designed to route orders simultaneously in a rules-based fashion to the major European messaging and clearing hubs. Importantly, with interfaces to brokerages and clearinghouses, Investia Javelin will also accept and route equity orders, meaning it can be used by wealth managers who invest directly as well as through mutual funds.
“The fund industry across Europe is currently plagued by inefficient and costly back-office manually intensive processes, and multiple interfaces to proprietary legacy systems and messaging protocols,” says Ron Lay, Investia’s Chief Technology Officer. He says one industry standards-setting body estimates the total cost, both direct and indirect, of manually re-keying orders at between 5 and 10 billion per year. “There exists no industry-wide standard or model for fund distribution and processing, which leads to unmanageable risk and costs to an organisation,” adds Lay. “Our latest release of Investia Javelin addresses precisely this pressing industry need.”
In the back office, Lay says the latest version of Javelin improves the management of cash movements and reconciliation. “Version 2.4 allows for a more simplified and direct interface with an investor’s banking account, allowing for an integrated portfolio view of a customer’s holdings, including cash, equities, and investment funds,” says the company. Security features were also enhanced.
“Fully deployed, the Investia Javelin system allows our major financial customers – fund managers, banks, insurance companies, financial advisor networks, brokerages and their service providers – to more rapidly link up to processing partners, to quickly implement new service and holistic wealth management offerings, and to efficiently manage their back-office processes and associated risks,” concludes Lay.