12/10/2003

Over 20 vendors who offer EAI and Web Services solutions to the Financial Services market were approached to participate in the first industry benchmarking study conducted by CityCompass, in partnership with the EAI (Enterprise Application Integration) Industry Consortium. Of those invited, the two vendors who were assessed in this study were PolarLake and TIBCO. A full report produced by Bloor Research analysing the benchmarks and the EAI and Web services vendor industry will be available early in the New Year.

The benchmarking assessment panel, comprising Steve Craggs of the EAI Industry Consortium, Bob Fuller of Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, Richard Cargill of Morley Fund Managers, Clive Verrall of BNP Paribas, Richard Wilson of HSBC and Amanda Sherwood of Independent Consultant, rated TIBCO highest in middle office benchmarks and issues with real time processing while PolarLake excelled in the areas of front office and real-time processing.

The benchmark user panel said "both vendors are fully exploiting open standards and allow flexibility in implementation." Although not in direct competition with each other both vendors were rated high in most of the same benchmark tests.

Gary Wright, Managing Director of CityCompass, said "We congratulate the two vendors who have participated in this first phase of the benchmarking of EAI and Web services technology for the financial services industry. One of the most interesting aspects to come out of this first phase has been the support for our belief that there is a knowledge gap between users and vendors. We have now seen clear evidence that there is indeed a marked difference between the depth of business knowledge on the vendor side and the depth of technology understanding on the user side. It is quite clear that confusion and frustration exists on both sides, with some vendors building clever solutions for problems that may not actually exist or are indeed not a priority for today's market. At CityCompass we are committed to helping bridge this gap with our benchmarking program, the next phase of which is underway with results being announced in September 2004."

Adds Steve Craggs, European Chair of the EAI Industry Consortium: "The Consortium has helped many end users and technology vendors come to grips with the challenges surrounding successful implementations of EAI and Web Services strategies. It is clear that the financial services sector has its own challenges and indeed some very specific requirements. The good news is that we are seeing that the lessons learned from all industry sectors can bring invaluable savings in time and money to practitioners who are seeking ways to capitalise on their IT investments and utilise existing resources to support their business needs."