SmartStream Technologies signs Mellon Global Investments for CorporateActions
SmartStream Technologies, the leading transaction management STP solutions provider, has announced that it has entered into a partnership with Mellon Global Investments (MGI), to realise straight through processing of corporate events.
The complexity of the corporate actions business demands extensive data management, communication and administration. Despite this, in the majority of financial institutions the processing of corporate events is still manual. Evidence has demonstrated that the risks resulting from human error can be expensive. High processing costs also mean that there are large financial savings to be made by asset managers, custodians, brokers and banks in automating this process.
The introduction of the new, Swift ISO 15022 standard message formats has acted as a catalyst in automating this previously neglected component of the STP chain.
Mellon Global Investments (MGI), is part of Mellon Financial Corporation, which has almost $600 billion assets under management and is the fourteenth largest global asset management group in the world. Streamlining operational efficiency and the reduction of operational risk are key elements of its strategy.
MGI already uses SmartStream Reconciliations, the industry leading multi-product matching and exceptions management solution, on a global basis. The selection of SmartStream Corporate Actions will allow it to integrate corporate events processing, generic matching and exceptions management into a single platform giving MGI control over the entire trade lifecycle. Furthermore, MGI’s decision to migrate SmartStream Reconciliations from an NT to a Unix platform will enable enterprise-wide deployment, building on the solution’s proven scalability.
Andrew Downs, Director of Investment Operations, MGI, commented: “The ability to integrate corporate actions, reconciliations and exceptions management into a single platform was integral to our decision to select SmartStream Corporate Actions. Corporate events by their nature create exceptions and the ability to identify these will significantly reduce workloads across numerous departments.”
Speaking on behalf of SmartStream Technologies, Mark Cappell, Sales Director for Northern Europe, said: “We welcome this opportunity to continue our work with MGI and build on our market leading position in reconciliations and exceptions management. Our strategy focuses on giving customers control over the entire trade lifecycle, so an extension of our solution into corporate actions made common sense. It is thanks to our scalable development infrastructure that we are able to respond so quickly to deliver best-of-breed solutions to meet the constantly evolving demands of our customers.”