Taking Trader Voice to the Cloud

In 1874, Alexander Graham Bell was working to disrupt the monopoly of the telegraph provider Western Union, which had reigned supreme for the prior 30 years with its dot-dash Morse code protocol. Bell was convinced that the telegraph could be modified to handle multiple messages being sent and received. In 1875, to Bell's surprise, he heard the sound of clock springs come across his wire during the experimentation of a new technique call "harmonic telegraph." The first words spoken were: "Mr. Watson, come here, I want to see you."

Approximately 140 years later, trader voice is a generic name given to a set of voice communication capabilities specifically designed for brokers and traders. It is a critical tool that enables market participants to communicate with one another on secure, recorded lines that span the globe. Traditionally, communication takes place on hardware devices called turrets, equipped with microphones and speakers that sit on traders' desks, awaiting various buttons to be pushed that instruct the voice data where and how to be carried. To date, trader voice has been carried through a mesh of legacy servers, switches, lines and protocols on private networks that are expensive to purchase, exhausting to maintain, and which provide little flexibility.

Launch

In 2013, Green Key Technologies launched Trader Voice Box, a suite of voice over IP (VoIP) technology applications leveraging cloud telecom and storage capabilities. Trader Voice Box enables global financial market participants to rapidly set up and instantly speak on private, secure voice networks without hardware. Communication takes place using a downloadable software client that is installed on users' PCs connecting over the internet into Green Key Technologies' cloud telecom infrastructure. This hosted VoIP solution was designed to unshackle brokers and traders from their telecom hardware devices and free them to communicate with their customers from anywhere in the world with the same level of security and privacy without sacrificing functionality.

Considering the regulatory landscape now mandates that voice is recorded from any device and that operations continue to run 24/7 despite unforeseen events such as weather or acts of terror, the market's move toward a more mobile, flexible telecommunication platform seems inevitable. In addition, the recent emergence of the SIP protocol, the now de facto communication standard which allows other data types like chat and video to be sent down the same channels, will only encourage more firms to think of their telephony as an application that needs to be integrated into the ecosystem rather than as standalone infrastructure.

Unification

As telecommunication becomes more application-based, especially after the adoption of SIP, look for a more "unified communication systems" to emerge. At Green Key Technologies, we are committed to providing our customers with a toolbox that allows them to rapidly set up, and enable their relationships to connect with them in a secure, private cloud-based environment in which voice, video and data can be shared, monitored and stored. The move to a managed voice environment will allow for unprecedented flexibility in terms of provisioning users and routing calls, and will encourage an entire industry of call tracking and metrics to flourish. In addition, the trader voice networks and directories of tomorrow will reflect a more open environment similar to that of social media, where users can be searched and connected to by a user rather than the closed, dark networks of today where providers maintain tight control over provisioning.

Considering the regulatory landscape now mandates that voice is recorded from any device and that operations continue to run 24/7 despite unforeseen events such as weather or acts of terror, the market’s move toward a more mobile, flexible telecommunication platform seems inevitable. In addition, the recent emergence of the SIP protocol, the now de facto communication standard which allows other data types like chat and video to be sent down the same channels, will only encourage more firms to think of their telephony as an application that needs to be integrated into the ecosystem rather than as standalone infrastructure.

Almost 140 years ago, Alexander Graham Bell asked Mr. Watson to "come here, I want to see you." Today, Mr. Watson doesn't need to go anywhere. He can be heard and seen, as well as share fi les, all through the same connection, with Green Key Technologies.

Sponsored content