Platforms, Platforms Everywhere As Hardware Firms Descend On Securities Industry Technology Show

The platform's the thing. Forget your soup-to-nuts quotation and branch automation system and hop aboard the platform bandwagon. You'll save money, take control of your destiny, and turn all of your brokers into million-dollar producers.

This was the message emitted endlessly on the exhibit floor at last month's Securities Industry Association Information Management Conference. Beyond the platform hoopla, however, the conference sessions showed a mellowed and somewhat weary Wall Street still very much plugged into its traditional suppliers.

This year's exhibition wasn't characterized so much by new products as it was by new players -- or at least old players in new guises. The computer industry has unanimously concluded that the retail branch system -- territory customarily ceded to Quotron et al. as a matter of course -- is now fair game. The result is an avalanche of systems platforms and a labyrinth of joint marketing deals.

A walk down "hardware alley" -- one stretch of the exhibit floor -- found IBM, DEC, Stratus, Tandem, Unisys, Data General, Sun, and Hewlett-Packard all clustered within a few feet of each other. Each sported a range of third-party software applications -- just what the doctor ordered to get Mr. Securities Industry Technologist to order tons of the appropriate iron.

Data General's third-party flock included Ninningham and Ollerich, National Investor Data Services, Profit-X, and International Treasury Systems. IBM hosted Devon Systems, Market Vision, Multrax, Citicorp's Fame, FD Consulting, and Intellicorp. H-P had S&P's Stockmate and FMS Datavestor. As for Sun, who knows? Nobody could get close enough.

Quotron's booth, by far the largest, served as Central Park to an otherwise cramped exhibit space. S&P Trading Systems managed to plant its Ticker III flag in nine different booths, thereby winning the guerrilla warfare award. Reuters couldn't get a live SDS2 feed to its booth, although DEC had live SDS2 data driving its prototype commodity trader's workstation.

Away from the exhibit floor, reality set in. At the opening day session on the broker workstation, for example, there was no talk of platforms, but instead talk of Quotron and ADP as branch automation specialists from Merrill Lynch, Pru-Bache, and A.G. Edwards discussed the roll-outs of their shiny new systems.

Contrary to the platform philosophy, a central reason A.G. Edwards went with Quotron's Q1000 system was to avoid buying a bunch of hardware, says vice president Charles Zurfluh. This turns systems expenses into variable costs, which can be a bonus in a down market. Installation of the Q1000s in the 350 Edwards branches will begin in mid-May, with the roll-out expected to take seven to eight months. Edwards is studying satellite for branch communications, something the Quotron controller can handle, says Zurfluh.

Pru-Bache has spent $30 million on its ADP FS+ system to date, says senior vice president John Settel, and before it's over it "probably will be going north from there" to the $35-40 million range. The firm is just beginning the roll-out of its "Boss II" Branch Office Support System, which was originally supposed to go on-line in 1986. At the moment, Pru-Bache's ADP system offers no more than a traditional quote terminal, he says, but Boss II will add portfolio management, investment profile, and electronic broker book capabilities as well. The roll-out will continue through the end of the year.

"We've been at this a while and we're running out of vendors," says Merrill Lynch vice president Ritch Gaiti. Merrill's ADP system is in "the last stages of development right now," he says, and the roll-out should be complete in 1990. The key in putting the system together is to combine ADP's FS-Partner system and Merrill Lynch's host-based applications in a seamless fashion. "The trick here is to make it look like everybody conceived of this total product at the same time when in fact it was developed by two different organizations -- ADP and Merrill Lynch -- at two different times," he says.