Witad Awards 2020: Technology Leader of the Year (Vendor)—Ann Neidenbach, LSEG

Ann Neidenbach, global head of technology and CIO, capital markets at the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), picked up not one, but two accolades at this year’s Women in Technology and Data Awards. She won the technology leader of the year (vendor) and woman of the year categories, which come hot on the heels of her win in the best third-party vendor CEO or CIO category in last year’s AFTAs.

“I have a passion for financial markets and the technology that drives them,” Neidenbach explains.

With over 20 years’ experience in the financial technology sector, that passion has been put into practice over a number of instrumental products and initiatives. Since joining LSEG 18 months ago, she has focused on a number of key initiatives. First, as CIO of shared services, she was able to formulate the LSEG Cloud-First Program, which is working to move 60% of the firm’s workload from capital markets, information services, and its post-trade business to the cloud in the next couple of years.

As well as actively working to migrate existing systems to the cloud, Neidenbach’s team is also building new cloud-native products and initiatives. “With capital markets, for instance, we launched a new platform on the public cloud called Turquoise Nylon, which supports contracts for difference trade reporting,” she says.

Earlier this year, Neidenbach was also appointed CIO for LSEG’s capital markets division. In this role, her focus is primarily on resilience and assembling a technology roadmap that will leverage automation and increase the firm’s agility and responsiveness to the needs of the market.

Neidenbach gained valuable experience from her roles as CIO at Convergex, managing director of electronic trading tech at Citi, and senior vice president of global technology at NASDAQ.

As to whether Neidenbach would change anything about her career path, she tells WatersTechnology: “Absolutely not.” Being a successful woman in the industry, she says, allows her to help other women to move into leadership positions. “It’s not about addressing gender parity—it’s about creating gender equality,” she says.