BT announced that Bank Julius Baer, a Swiss dedicated wealth manager, has implemented 200 of its ITS.Netrix trading turrets and ITS Management Suite across locations in Zurich, Geneva and Singapore. Going forward the firm plans to implement an additional 50 turrets in its New York City office.

Phil Mottram, managing director, trading systems, BT Global Financial Services, says that the solution in Switzerland was delivered in partnership with Swisscom. “We sent in a local BT as well and the two teams work together to set up the solution and integrate it within the wider environment,” he adds.

Mottram says Julius Baer was looking for a next generation solution, something BT is driving into its products and solutions. He says that overall the turret market is entering a third phase in its 30-year market life.

Mottram explains that turrets began with the stand-alone phase, where they didn't interact with the wider IT infrastructure. Next was the distributed phase, says Mottram, where turrets began to integrate and communicate directly with the wider IT environment within firms. This phase also included the advent of Web-based turrets for anywhere, anytime access.

“The third phase we are terming the embedded phase,” he says. “We break down the functionality that exists within the traders switch and embed that within the network. For example, users can get hundreds of people on a conference call instantly.” Mottram adds that the embedded turret phase also provides disaster recovery benefits as the technology can be spread across the wider network.

“During this phase the turret is embedded in the customers network and also in our own BT network,” says Mottram. “And once embedded, customers can also offer the same functionality out to their customers.”