Our client, the largest Global Interdealer Broker was formed through a merger which was announced at the end of 2016. The new entity anticipated making significant cost savings through consolidation of its back-office technology and operations. A series of technology-led initiatives were identified as part of the integration programme which included:

• Transitioning the core development and operations capability to a strategic Technology Centre in Northern Ireland
• Migrating the pre and post trade systems used by the brokers to a common technology stack
• Reorganising the Target Operating model to optimise in-house and third-party human resources

• Review of Testing & QA resources against planned system migrations and definition of a target state QA Operating model, which was the input for a strategic test partner RFP
• Reviewed current state of test automation and provided strategic direction for increased automation coverage with increased quality management information
• Supplied an interim Global Head of QA to continue working with the CIO to define future state testing approach as part of the restructuring of the technology team

• Our client now has a clear understanding of the annual spend on testing and QA resourcing
• Started vendor consolidation work and automated testing review that has made immediate savings of £73,000 per month
• Planned vendor consolidation set to deliver 55% reduction overall, c. £4.2 Million annualised by the end of 2019