Following a series of exhaustive benchmarks that included access to IBM's
future plans for RS/6000, AIX and Java technologies, the International
Petroleum Exchange (IPE) has selected IBM and its OEM partner (CRM, Ltd.)
to provide hardware, software, and services for a Java-based solution that
will provide centralized, automated brokerage service for more than 200
member companies.
Recently, the topic of brokerage has become a hot issue for the banking
and securities industry. There are difficulties with the reconciliation
of brokerage and late payment of disputed invoices. With the increasing
amount of brokerage, and the pressure to reduce brokerage rates, the existing
administrative costs are an unnecessary burden on this business. IPE and
LIFFE members have actively been lobbying the Exchanges and the IFA and
FOA to take action. Other trading centers around the world have already
centralized automated brokerage services to the significant advantage
of those markets.
After a considerable amount of research, IPE and LCH proposed
the development of an Automated Brokerage Service system. The Service
will provide online matching of brokerage agreements, calculate brokerage
values due to members, provide an automatic monthly payment facility for
fees between clearing members, and produce statements of brokerage fees
for clearing members, locals and clients.
The system runs on RS/6000 Model R50 rack mounted SMP systems and utilizes
a database with the VisiBroker ORB from Visigenic Software. The application
is being developed using JDK 1.1.2 of AIX 4.3, and IBM's Global Services has
provided the technical consultancy for the project. IPE is evaluating IBM's
application development environment -- VisualAge for Java and the IBM Network
Station 1000 for future projects.