IT Transformation/CLIENT CASE
KNEIP: sustainably integrating change In 23 years, KNEIP has lived through several major digital transformations. Today, the FinTech company has adopted an open IT architecture and a flexible IT infrastructure, whose implementation and management were entrusted to EBRC. Thanks to these efforts, the company, which is involved in the management of financial data, is ready to confront the technological and regulatory revolutions to come.
Lee Godfrey, CEO, KNEIP
“EBRC allows us to focus on our core business and applications. We know that we have a trustful partner who is able to scale and meet the demands of our business.” 12
23 years ago, KNEIP mostly juggled with impressive amounts of paper. The company founded by Bob Kneip has always responded to the needs of the investment funds industry. At the time, it supported companies in their efforts to meet legal obligations, by offering distribution channels for their official publications and ensuring the legally required publishing of their general assemblies. “Digital was just a dream for most, we were living in a world of print”, says Lee Marshall, Head of IT Operations & Infrastructure of KNEIP. Since then, the world has changed, and KNEIP brilliantly managed to take the digital turn, again and again. “Digital has always been key for KNEIP and happened early on in our life as we continued to grow our business within Europe and also outside.” KNEIP quickly realised that its development would depend on the commodity that financial data represents and on its own ability to exploit it. “To ensure sustainable development in a rapidly changing environment, it is important to be able to project into the future, starting with a good understanding of the trends driving the current market, explains Lee Godfrey, CEO of KNEIP. By becoming aware of the growing need for information of companies in the fund industry, we could consistently adapt our IT systems in order to process an increasing volume of data and to deliver information more quickly, in a wide variety of media, while ensuring its high quality...”
One of the largest suppliers in the world for fund-related information In 2008, KNEIP contacts Bloomberg. The Luxembourg hub wishes to deliver
information on its investment fund customers to the media company. To convince this influential player, KNEIP offers to provide information that can immediately be released. Until then, Bloomberg had to verify the information it received in heterogeneous tables from fund managers, prior their broadcast. 8 or 10 days could pass before the release of these transmitted data. “Internally, we had implemented processes and information systems to check the validity of the transmitted information directly, in order to use it immediately”, recalls Lee Godfrey. It did not take long to convince Bloomberg and then other media companies to trust KNEIP. The company quickly started allowing its customers to upload their data via a simple portal. The FinTech Company then took care of its verification, while making the effort to automate the processing methods over time to improve efficiency. “In this way, KNEIP has become one of the largest information providers in the whole world in terms of fund data for Bloomberg”, says Lee Godfrey.
Combining automation and diversification Based on the data itself and on its processing, the company diversified its services to make things easier for the actors of the fund industry. “As the number of services provided along with the volume and diverse reach for these products grew, we have always needed to remain cognizant to ensure their automation and the high level of accuracy and control for the contained data. It is vital not only for the operations side of KNEIP but most importantly for the clients, while ensuring their own corporate brand
