The US venture comes at a time when market savvy investment firms are gearing up front office investment towards initiatives, such as adaptive trading, that will help them grab early mover advantage following the recent turmoil.

As the financial landscape evolves, firms require non-disruptive, scalable technology that will streamline operations, facilitate innovation and offer value. Quod Financial's Adaptive Execution Platform (AEP) has been built specifically to support the demands of the electronic trading markets and couples intelligent, decision-making tools for dynamic markets with a non-invasive approach to deployment. The multi-asset platform can be deployed on a modular basis and scaled to address future needs while embracing an organisation's existing infrastructure.

"In North America, order routing has already been implemented across the board in a rudimentary manner," said Rawal. "Now, however, there is a clear need for adaptive trading technology that can manage liquidity needs more intelligently as fragmentation in the US continues. Our entry into the region is timely as Quod Financial's Adaptive Execution Platform will provide early adopters with the technology to streamline trading processes, lower costs and set the standard for others to follow. Our non-disruptive approach to deployment delivers maximum return on investment on existing technology and applications and empowers the most valuable resource, people, to further develop the technology, enabling businesses to acquire and keep more customers."

"Quod Financial has developed AEP as part of its vision to transform electronic trading; it enables organisations to change the way they execute trades by using adaptive trading technologies across the whole lifecycle and enterprise. Dhiren's leadership and experience will support our goal of AEP becoming a valued part of every major trading room," said Ali Pichvai, CEO, Quod Financial. "His strong understanding of the business, technology and C-level communities will be crucial as we extend our global capabilities for existing and future customers."

While at Accenture's Capital Markets practice, Rawal successfully oversaw the implementation of projects designed to streamline operations, achieve return on investment (ROI) and institute best practices for banks, investment managers, broker-dealers and exchanges across the world. Rawal also launched and managed Accenture's Global Market Data practice, including the outsourcing, information procurement and cost optimisation businesses.