GSTP AG confirmed today that it had, as expected, appointed SunGard as its new facilities manager following the ending of its relationship with the axion4 consortium. SunGard will now host and operate the Transaction Flow Manager (TFM) for the GSTP AG utility.
SunGard says it has worked with GSTP AG for some time, and this represents merely a “broadening” of the relationship. SunGard was certainly one of the first companies to promise to become a “message concentrator,” the means by which GSTPA hoped to garner a fund management and broker-dealing clients.
However, SunGard has also nursed ambitions to develop a full-blown global STP utility business of its own for some time, and this deal provides a useful shortcut for the IT company as well as a lifeline for the ailing GSTPA project, which is struggling to attract clients at all in the current recessionary environment. It is significant that SunGard will become a shareholder in GSTP AG. The deal will also set back hopes in some quarters of a merger between Omgeo and GSTP AG.
One uncertainty is cleared up, however. SunGard has confirmed that GSTP AG will go live with the TFM in September 2002 this year. “This is precisely the goal of our internalization drive”, says Jrgen Marziniak, CEO of GSTP AG. “By assuming direct control over the provision of service, we are able to bring the best and brightest talent to GSTP AG as the industry’s utility. I can tell you we are very pleased to have SunGard as our facilities management partner.”
Robert Greifeld, Executive Vice President at SunGard, added: “SunGard has always been committed to the work of GSTP AG and now this relationship gives us even more tangible means of demonstrating this to the industry.”