Advantage Business Systems To Test NT-Based Analytics For Portfolio System

Advantage Business Systems Inc. (ABS) is developing quantitative analysis software using Microsoft Corp.'s new Windows/NT operating system software. Ultimately, the analytics may be integrated with a version of ABS's multicurrency portfolio accounting software written for Windows/NT running on both RISC and Intel Corp. chips. Currently ABS's software operates only under DOS.

ABS executives are betting that Windows/NT will prove to be a more popular operating system among financial institutions than UNIX or IBM's OS/2. IBM has launched a new version of OS/2 that runs Windows and DOS on an Intel processor, but no plans have been announced to offer OS/2 on a RISC platform.

Additionally, ABS executives believe that the millions of Microsoft DOS and Windows users will be more inclined to migrate to Microsoft's NT than to IBM's OS/2, purely from familiarity and confidence with Microsoft. Microsoft has said recently that new versions of Windows will be incompatible with OS/2.

ABS has already developed and installed various customized multicurrency portfolio accounting systems, including one at a big East Coast manager (IMT, Dec. 13, 1991). Executives at ABS say that by placing their software on the new NT operating system running on Intel architecture or on a MIPS Inc. machine with a RISC chip, ABS will be able to offer integrated solutions that will appeal to both buy- and sell-side users.

Microsoft has announced that it is pre-releasing limited copies of the new Windows/NT operating system. The system provides such features as multi-tasking and networking, Microsoft says. ABS executives say that the combination of analytics and portfolio accounting software for NT/Windows won't be ready for six to 12 months because NT remains in beta.

However, ABS executives say that, in the meantime, they will be able to offer various custom-developed Windows-based systems that can be moved over to Windows/NT when tests are completed.

ABS executives are high on Windows/NT because their custom portfolio accounting software is built around a FoxPro database management system marketed by Perrysburg, Ohio-based Fox Software Inc. Fox Software was recently purchased by Microsoft, and ABS expects FoxPro to be the first of the DOS-based RDBMS to be ported to NT.

Microsoft's founder, Bill Gates, has said that "the merger with Fox Software will provide Microsoft with great development talent. We will soon be able to offer customers a complete family of superior database applications and development environments."

"We have two years experience with FoxPro," says Michael Alesandro, senior analyst and a principal of ABS, which provides computer consulting services. "If NT becomes a hot operating system in the financial industry, our FoxPro-based systems will be one of the first, if not the first offering in that area."

Alesandro expects that aggressive buy-side money managers running DOS/Windows will probably want to migrate to NT, running either on RISC or Intel chips. ABS's custom portfolio applications run on a 486-based server supporting 386-based IBM-compatible PCs linked by a Token Ring/Novell local area network. The FoxPro RDBMS, which would contain historical information, can sit on the same server.

Microsoft's new NT software is attracting attention because it contains a set of UNIX-like routines at the heart of the operating system, sources say. Additionally, while much of the software community has thus far declined to write programs for OS/2, Microsoft Windows and DOS systems continue to garner a steady stream of applications software.

However, IBM is fighting back with the release of its new OS/2 2.0. The system, according to published reports, is a vast step ahead of OS/2 version 1.3. Like NT, OS/2 2.0 can run Windows and DOS; OS/2's Workplace Shell, IBM's second-generation graphical user interface, utilizes object-oriented methods of programming. OS/2's ability to run on 32-bit architecture allows programmers to take advantage of more powerful hardware solutions now being offered. Windows/NT also exploits the speed and power of 32-bit architecture.

Besides NT's expected presence on PCs, Microsoft, in partnership with MIPS, is developing a whole series of NT versions for RISC chips. The NT operating system could run on Hewlett-Packard Co., IBM and Sun Microsystems Inc. platforms.