Brian Lynn, a driving force behind the creation of FpML.org and formerly VP of eTrading Systems at JPMorgan Chase has announced the formation of Gem Soup, a new organisation devoted to the collaborative development of software tools supporting FpML communications between firms.
Named after the legend about collaboration in the financial industry, Gem Soup supports a set of community source products for working with FpML, in areas such as matching, messaging servers, and message validation.
From 1999 until this month Lynn was co-chair of the FpML standards committee and JPMorgan's representative at the standards setting body. He says he established Gem Soup with the aim of speeding the adoption of inter-company STP in OTC derivatives trading by creating a collaborative community of industry participants and providers who will share the development of key integration technologies.
"Over the last several years there has been a rapid increase in the breadth and maturity of the FpML standard, and in the deployment of FpML within firms," says Lynn. "However, it has only been recently that we have started to see growth in the use of FpML between companies. Gem Soup will accelerate that trend by making FpML easy to use and easy to integrate with existing business processes."
It is envisaged that Gem Soup will develop or acquire initial versions of its products, and will provide its members with a collaboration environment, product strategy guidance, an automated testing suite, a release control process, and product documentation and support. Gem Soup members will be expected to contribute enhancements and fixes, provide input on priorities, and incorporate the tools into their own systems and business processes.
Products that are currently planned include an FpML viewer/editor, a simple FpML API, a matching tool, a trade archive, and message validators and converters. Many of these will be based on simple product templates, which will make them easy to customise for new financial products, says Lynn. Several will be available in low-cost versions to support application development.
Lynn claims that interest in the initiative is high and that he is currently discussing product priorities with initial adopters.
Commenting on the initiative, Gill Lungley, MD and global head of IT at UBS Warburg, says: "FpML has become increasingly vital in enabling key market initiatives, such as Swapswire. The provision of new tools will further promote FpML and thus support ongoing creation of these important industry initiatives."