BST Awards 2010 - Confirmed Categories and Entry Information

The 2010 Buy-Side Technology Awards

Important dates:

• Closing date for entries: End of business, Friday 17 September
• Winners announced: End of business, Friday 15 October
• Awards function: Friday 5 November, from 12.00 onwards (venue to be confirmed, although the awards lunch will take place in London).

Below is the final list of categories for this year's Buy-Side Technology Awards. This year's awards will feature 24 categories in total, 22 of which will be decided prior to the awards lunch, while the remaining two will be announced on the day.

Buy-Side Technology Awards 2010 Categories for 2010

• Best buy-side OMS
• Best buy-side EMS
• Best buy-side risk/portfolio analytics product
• Best buy-side performance measurement and attribution product
• Best buy-side algorithmic/DMA product or service
• Best buy-side commodities trading platform
• Best buy-side pricing/valuation service
• Best buy-side data management product
• Best data provider to the buy side
• Best integrated front-office platform
• Best portfolio accounting platform
• Best buy-side client reporting platform
• Best broker-supplied tool/technology
• Best buy-side compliance product
• Best buy-side execution venue (crossing network or dark pool)
• Best fund administrator
• Best buy-side newcomer (vendor or product)
• Best product implementation at a buy-side firm
• Best overall buy-side product for 2010 (announced on November 5, 2010)
• Best buy-side technology provider for 2010 (announced on November 5, 2010)

New categories for 2010

• Best buy-side risk management initiative over the last 12 months
• Best buy-side CRM (customer relationship management) product/service
• Best CEP (complex-event processing) product/service
• Best buy-side reconciliation platform/service

General Entry Information

• Entry to the 4th annual Buy-Side Technology Awards is free and online only
• Please email all entries to victor.anderson@incisivemedia.com
• Each entry should be separate i.e. If you are entering three different products in different categories, you will need to submit three separate emails (see email criteria below)
• Entries should consist of a Word document containing the information laid out in the entry template
• The word count for each entry is restricted to 500 words (no more). Extra copy will be deleted
• All company/product details and names of reference clients (see below) are strictly confidential.
• Please note that the quality of your entry (reference clients, general information, lay-out etc) has a bearing on the outcome of each category. Over the past three years it has become clear that certain entrants have gone to great lengths to provide the judging panel with as much transparency as possible regarding their products and the company in general. These types of entries stand a greater chance of success than those consisting of a ‘cut-and-paste-job' from the company website.

What Your Entry Should Look Like

• The subject line for every email sent to victor.anderson@incisivemedia.com should contain the following: BST Awards 2010, the abbreviated category (see Category and Criteria for abbreviations), and the product name.

An example appears below:
Example: Subject: BST awards 2010, OMS, SwiftRoute

Along with each 500-word entry must be the following:
• An up-to-date summary of the firm's total installation numbers (live sites)*
• An up-to-date summary of the firm's new clients since June 2009 (live sites, not contracts)
• The names and contact details (direct dial telephone number and email addresses) of three reference clients
• Entrants are advised to include only the technical specifications and benefits/advantages of their products. Marketing material is a waste of words.

* Please note that BST reserves the right to disqualify an entrant if any of the submitted information is inaccurate.

Eligibility

The Buy-Side Technology Awards 2010 are open to all technology firms, brokers, and buy-side institutions regardless of their size, location, or ownership. Organizations may enter as many categories as they wish, as long as they genuinely believe they meet the criteria listed alongside each category.
The judging panel will consider all entries to each category. Where appropriate (due to large numbers), a shortlist of three entries per category will be drawn up by the panel.

Category winners will be contacted directly by Lee Hartt/Victor Anderson on or before Friday 15 October 2010; winners should be available to receive their awards at the Buy-Side Technology Awards 2010 function on November 5, 2010.

Entrants should carefully read and consider the criteria of the category they are entering. The listed criteria are functions/qualities that the panel is looking for - entrants should be aware, however, that the criteria serve only as a guide to entrants and not a definitive description of the winning product. Entrants may enter as many categories as they wish, as long as they meet the qualifying criteria.

Check List

• Have you submitted a separate email entry for each product entered?
• Have you included the three criteria in the subject line: BST Awards 2010, the category you are entering, and the name of your product?
• Have you kept to the word count (500 words)?
• Have you included your three reference clients together with direct dial telephone numbers and email addresses?
• Have you included your total client list for the product you are entering and the number of new clients since June 2009?
• Have you included the contact details of the appropriate person in the event that your company wins a category?

Categories and Criteria (What the judging panel is looking for)

(Please note that the winners of the best overall buy-side product for 2010 and the best buy-side technology provider for 2010 will be announced on the day of the awards lunch. All category winners will be considered for both of these above-mentioned categories.)

Best buy-side OMS
Platforms should feature pre-trade (deal time) and post-trade compliance; support for a range of asset classes including derivatives; a trading blotter; FIX-enabled connectivity; and order generation and routing functions. (Abbreviation: OMS)

Best buy-side EMS
Platforms should feature multi-broker/exchange connectivity; pre-trade transaction cost analysis (TCA); algorithmic trading tools and DMA; and should show strong integration capabilities with OMSs. (Abbreviation: EMS)

Best buy-side risk/portfolio analytics product
Functions include risk-based portfolio modeling; ‘what if' analysis; stress testing; Monte Carlo simulation; and (ideally) the ability to provide VaR and NAV figures. (Abbreviation: risk)

Best buy-side performance measurement and attribution product
Functions include calculation of returns for portfolios (benchmarks and composites); calculation of attribution effects for equity and fixed-income portfolios; and calculation of ex-post risk, absolute and relative. (Abbreviation: performance)

Best buy-side algorithmic/DMA product or service
Functions include variety of pre-packaged trading algorithms; ability to test strategies; ability to analyze an interpret market events; ease-of-use and easy to understand GUI (this category covers discrete algorithmic trading products and not EMSs). (Abbreviation: algo)

Best buy-side commodities trading platform/service
The panel is looking for a trading platform (or pricing service) developed specifically to support buy-side organizations trading energy, metals, and agricultural instruments. (Abbreviation: commodities)

Best buy-side pricing/valuation service
Services will be judged on broadness of product coverage; contributing pricing partners; methodology; and specificity to the buy side. (Abbreviation: pricing)

Best buy-side data management product
Functions include repository management (design, storage, archiving, retrieval, distribution of data); content management (importing and cleansing routines); business intelligence tools designed to allow authorized business users to interrogate data repository; creation of reports and manufacture of data sets. (Abbreviation: data management)

Best data provider to the buy side
The panel is looking for ability to integrate with other systems; also, quality data provision and other functional services. (Abbreviation: data provider)

Best integrated front-office platform
Functions include the bulk management of multi-asset portfolios to the same benchmark; OMS and EMS functions; modeling; analytics; compliance; multi-asset class coverage. (Abbreviation: front office)

Best portfolio accounting platform
Functions include the ability to support multiple currencies, transactions, and instruments (asset classes); back-office connectivity; flexibility and scalability. (Abbreviation: accounting)

Best buy-side client reporting platform
Functions include the ability to customize report formats and the look and feel of reports for different clients and/or portfolios; automated production of reports; and ability to manage source data and to monitor production status. (Abbreviation: reporting)

Best broker-supplied tool/technology
This category is open to any platform/tool provided by a broker or prime broker to its buy-side clients. (Abbreviation: broker)

Best buy-side compliance product
Functions include pre- and post-trade compliance capabilities, tools to monitor compliance both with internal policies and external mandates and regulations, and the ability to integrate with other front- and middle-office applications. Both stand-alone compliance platforms and modules available as part of larger applications, will be considered. (Abbreviation: compliance)

Best buy-side execution venue (crossing network or dark pool)
This category's award will go to the dark pool/crossing network provider best able to provide investment managers access to non-listed liquidity with minimal information leakage. (Abbreviation: execution)

Best fund administrator
This category is looking for the industry's best fund administrator (for all types of funds including mutual funds, hedge funds and pension funds) and will be decided on the range of its services and the robustness of its technology, especially relating to the calculation of NAVs and various pricing/valuation functions. (Abbreviation: administrator)

Best buy-side newcomer (vendor or product)
This category is open to any technology vendor established since June 2007 or any product launched since June 2007 with at least one live client. Upgrades are not considered to be new products. (Abbreviation: newcomer)

Best product implementation at a buy-side firm
This category seeks to highlight a specific product implementation that has gone live between June 2008 and June 2009. The winning implementation will need to have been completed on time and on budget; the winning entry will need to explain (in detail) why the implementation is deserving of this award. (Abbreviation: implementation)

Best buy-side risk management initiative over the last 12 months
This category seeks to acknowledge enhancements to an existing risk management platform or the launch of a new risk management tool (unveiled since June 2009), designed to address current risk management challenges across the buy side. (Abbreviation: risk initiative)

Best buy-side CRM (customer relationship management) product/service
The winning entry in this category should include functionality designed specifically to allow buy-side firms to efficiently manage client relationships that are growing both in terms of numbers and complexity.
(Abbreviation: CRM)

Best CEP (complex-event processing) product/service
Most CEP vendors in this space provide similar functionality; therefore, what the panel is looking for, are examples of where the technology has enabled buy-side firms to manage either their high-frequency trading activities or their risk management functions in a close-to-real-time environment.
(Abbreviation: CEP)

Best buy-side reconciliation platform/service
The winner product in this category would need to address the following: exception management, it should provide interfaces to widely-used matching engines, and it should support the automatic reconciliation of a large number of instruments, especially OTC derivatives.
(Abbreviation: reconciliation)