BT has appointed Howard Edelstein, president and CEO of its recently acquired Radianz unit, as head of a new business division focused on serving the global financial industry.
BT bought the Radianz financial extranet from Reuters for $175 million in April this year. Edelstein had been heading up the Radianz unit since July 2003, when he took over from Doug Gilstrap.
Prior to joining Radianz Edelstein was president and CEO of Thomson Financial ESG, which he founded and later merged with the Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation's Tradesuite business to create trade matching utility Omgeo.
BT says going forward Edelstein will serve as president and CEO of a vertically-integrated financial services business, which will be housed in its Global Services division.
Andy Green, BT Global Services CEO says the new unit will create a single point of contact for BT's clients within the financial industry. The creation of the unit is part of BT's strategy to transform iself from a telco to a global services organisation.
The new unit will combine three BT businesses - Radianz, Trading Systems and Global Financial Solutions. Trading Systems technology is used by 60,000 traders in 1400 trading rooms worldwide, while the Global Financial Solutions unit claims nearly 50 financial IT outsourcing clients.