Sell-Side Technology Awards 2016: Best Sell-Side Data Management Product — Markit

After falling to Golden Source in 2014, Markit has captured the best sell-side data management product category for the last two years, after winning the inaugural award in 2013.

The common theme in several of this year’s award categories—which will only become more daunting with each passing year—is that of banks and brokerages having to manage an ever-growing sea of data, and that data is covering a wider variety of domains.

According to Spiros Giannaros, managing director of Markit EDM, Markit EDM uses a flexible data model and has the ability to pull any data type—from trade, operational and risk data, through to customer data—from multiple sources into a central hub. “This can all be achieved without the need for custom development by either our customers or by us,” he says. “The central hub sources, validates, enriches, normalizes and aggregates data, and then enables the visualization, interrogation and distribution of that data in the specific format needed by other business units within the bank, such as the investment, asset management, wealth or retail banking arms.”

Firms are also incorporating Markit EDM into their internal data optimization and rationalization projects, according to Giannaros. Through this, firms can better measure how much source data is making it into their master datasets, which allows users to more fully understand how much of that data is being consumed by the lines of business. “These types of projects ensure customers are making the most efficient use of vendor datasets and are obtaining the best quality data, at the best possible value,” he says.

For its development roadmap, Markit has focused on scalability and throughput over the last year. The reason for this is that datasets are growing exponentially larger for industry participants and service-level agreements for processing data requests are getting shorter, Giannaros says.

Markit has also aimed to improve the user experience, as Markit EDM now supports the simplified configuration of business rules, as well as a more dynamic web-based front-end that allows users to better analyze data, understand data lineage, and support comprehensive business workflows.

Markit has also aimed to improve the user experience, as Markit EDM now supports the simplified configuration of business rules, as well as a more dynamic web-based front-end that allows users to better analyze data, understand data lineage, and support comprehensive business workflows.

Markit’s growth has been a combination of both organic development and acquisitions. In October, it bought CoreOne with its VistaOne platform, to enhance EDM’s warehousing and reporting functionalities. “We are seeing particular demand for EDM Warehouse as firms seek to effectively manage the storage of regulatory data points and risk measures,” Giannaros says.

At the most recent Waters Rankings awards, voted on solely by end-users, Markit also took home the award for best EDM solution.