Leading Fixed-Income Manager Will Also Invest In Straight-Through Processing Solution
NEW YORK, October 24, 2000 – Accenture today announced that Pacific Investment Management Company ("PIMCO"), one of the world's leading fixed income asset managers, has signed a letter of intent to become the first client of WEBeSTP, the straight-through processing (STP) solution that Accenture is developing with industry participants and select service providers for the global investment / asset management community.
WEBeSTP is an Internet portal that will provide financial industry participants with a single automated point of entry for pre-trade, trade and post-trade activities. It will also link customer relationship management and enterprise resource management with real- time portfolio management capabilities. Its primary purpose is to help asset managers and other financial markets players reduce the costs and risks currently associated with the end-to-end process of securities trading.
Working closely with PIMCO, Accenture has defined the asset managers' requirements for a customer relationship management and market-data integration solution. Bloomberg, which announced its participation in WEBeSTP back in June, is working to develop the fixed income portfolio management and order management capabilities.
The securities industry today is being stretched to the limit by record trading volumes, extended trading hours, intense competition, changing customer expectations and the move to T+1 in the United States. A solution to this challenge is STP, an integrated approach to achieving automated, end-to-end trade processing through the trade's entire lifecycle, beginning and ending with the investor.
"From an asset manager's perspective, there are three primary drivers for implementing WEBeSTP – cost reduction, cost avoidance and risk reduction. According to the recently completed SIA T+1 business case, asset managers have the weakest return on investment economics. WEBeSTP is targeted to solve that problem," said Jim Honohan, partner, Accenture. "By leveraging the experience and knowledge of PIMCO and Accenture, we are able to focus specifically on what the asset managers' needs are in implementing an integrated STP solution."
"With increased pressure and competition, as well as heightened customer expectations, we have to focus now more than ever on strengthening our customer relationships and managing their portfolios. We were searching for a solution that would reduce risk and cost while allowing us to enhance our customer service, and WEBeSTP was the most comprehensive solution in the market," said Robert Ettl, Chief Information Officer of PIMCO.
"Finding a cost-effective STP solution is one of the greatest problems confronting asset managers. Our involvement with the Accenture WEBeSTP solution would be consistent with Bloomberg's commitment to provide STP solutions within a value proposition that enhances returns and will enable asset managers to focus on their core competencies of investment management and customer relationship management," said Lou Eccleston, director of global transaction and data services at Bloomberg.
Straight-Through Processing (STP)
STP solutions are needed to help financial markets firms meet the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's expected call for one-day trade settlement (T+1), as well as to meet the global demand that has resulted from the explosive growth of online trading. Presently, the entire trade lifecycle, from initiation to settlement, is a complex labyrinth of manual processes, taking several days. STP enables the entire trade process to be conducted electronically without the need for re- keying or manual intervention. When fully realized, STP will provide broker/dealers, asset managers, custodians and other financial services players with tremendous benefits, including greatly shortened processing cycles, reduced risk and lower operating costs.
WEBeSTP
The Accenture WEBeSTP solution was conceived and is being developed at the Accenture STP Center of Excellence, located in New York City. Accenture is in discussions with other select service providers and industry participants regarding their potential involvement in WEBeSTP.
About PIMCO
PIMCO, with more than $200 billion under management, is based in Newport Beach, California. It is a subsidiary of the Munich-based Allianz Group, which is a leading global insurance company that is represented in 70 countries around the globe.
About Bloomberg
Bloomberg L.P. is a global, multi-media based distributor of information services, combining news, data and analysis for financial markets and businesses. Bloomberg provides real-time pricing, historical pricing, data, analytics and electronic communications 24 hours a day through 150,000 BLOOMBERG PROFESSIONALSM terminals used by over 400,000 financial professionals in 100 countries worldwide. Bloomberg's electronic trading products include: BLOOMBERG TRADEBOOK™, BLOOMBERG POWERMATCH™ and the BLOOMBERG™ Electronic Trading System. Bloomberg News, with 850 reporters in 78 bureaus, is live 24 hours a day over the BLOOMBERG PROFESSIONALSM service and is carried in over 850 newspapers worldwide. Bloomberg also produces a number of related print and electronic media products for distribution worldwide. These include BLOOMBERG TELEVISION® and BLOOMBERG RADIO programming, Bloomberg, Bloomberg Personal Finance and Bloomberg Wealth Manager magazines, The BLOOMBERG® Web Site (
http://www.bloomberg.com) and the BLOOMBERG PRESS® line of investment books.
Accenture is the world's leading provider of management and technology consulting services and solutions, with more than 75,000 people in 46 countries delivering a wide range of specialized capabilities and solutions to clients across all industries. Accenture operates globally with one common brand and business model designed to enable the company to serve its clients on a consistent basis around the world. Under its strategy, Accenture is building a network of businesses to meet the full range of any organization's needs — consulting, technology, outsourcing, alliances and venture capital. The company generated revenues of $9.75 billion for the fiscal year ended August 31, 2000 and $5.71 billion for the six months ended February 28, 2001. Its home page is
http://www.accenture.com.
A registration statement relating to the offering has been filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission but has not yet become effective. The shares may not be sold nor may offers to buy be accepted prior to the time the registration statement becomes effective. This release shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy, nor shall there be any sale of the shares in any state or other jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such state or jurisdiction.
This announcement appears as a matter of record only and should not be taken as an inducement or solicitation to subscribe for shares in any subsequent initial public offering.
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