< The 2017 Tech 40

7. David Craig
President,
Financial & Risk
Thomson Reuters
Last year: 12

The first-quarter revenue of Financial & Risk, the unit of Thomson Reuters headed by David Craig, rose 1 percent year-over-year, to $1.5 billion. Modest, yes, but to Craig it is a breakout from a flat 2016 and a cause for optimism. Organic growth was 2 percent, and the transactions segment, which includes Tradeweb Markets, jumped 4 percent. "It has taken four or five years for us to get to this place," Craig says, referring to an overhaul of his group's product lines and the early adoption of a platform-oriented strategy, which required investments in information technology and time to educate the marketplace. "There is now more confidence around the results and our ability to reinvest," the 47-year-old says. A former McKinsey & Co. partner, Craig joined the news and information company in London in 2007 as chief strategy officer; founded and became president of its governance, risk, and compliance business in 2010; and rose to president of Financial & Risk in 2012. Although platform strategies, which often engage customers or partners in developing innovations, have become commonplace, Thomson Reuters was ahead of the curve when it launched the Eikon desktop network and the Elektron trading infrastructure in 2010. A third major platform, Accelus, came out of Craig's GRC business in 2011 and was later renamed Risk Management Solutions. Meanwhile, the group eliminated about 600 of its 850 products in what Craig calls a "streamline and simplify" campaign. A regulatory technology play, Risk Management Solutions includes Org ID, "the market leader in KYC," or Know Your Customer, compliance services, Craig notes. With the acquisition this year of Avox and Clarient Global from Depository Trust & Clearing Corp., Org ID is managing more than 350,000 KYC records and data on 1.25 million legal entities worldwide. Another example of what Craig calls a "more selective" acquisition strategy is the January 2017 purchase of the REDI Holdings buy side–facing execution management system from a consortium of banks. On June 13, Thomson Reuters said it is working to integrate Eikon with the Symphony Communication Services messaging and collaboration platform, which has 200,000 licensed users in 170 companies, including 40 top asset managers and 25 of the largest global banks.

 
The 2017 Tech 40

1. Adena Friedman NASDAQ 2. Catherine Bessant Bank of America Corp. 3. Robert Goldstein BlackRock 4. Jeffrey Sprecher Intercontinental Exchange Finding, Applying for, and Winning Grant Funding: Tips for Nonprofits Sponsored by Fidelity Investments April 28, 2025 5. Lance Uggla IHS Markit

6. Shawn Edwards & Vlad Kliatchko Bloomberg 7. David Craig Thomson Reuters 8. Michael Spencer NEX Group 9. Don Callahan Citigroup 10. Elisha Wiesel Goldman Sachs Group

11. Michael Bodson Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. 12. Terrence Duffy CME Group 13. Charles Li Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing 14. Sean Belka Fidelity Investments 15. Chris Concannon CBOE Holdings

16. Guy Chiarello First Data Corp. 17. Steven Lieblich Citadel 18. David Rutter R3CEV 19. Blythe Masters Digital Asset Holdings 20. Alfred Spector Two Sigma Investments

21. Neil Katz D.E. Shaw Group 22. Lee Olesky Tradeweb Markets 23. Richard McVey MarketAxess Holdings 24. David Gledhill DBS Bank 25. Seth Merrin Liquidnet Holdings

26. Antoine Shagoury State Street Corp. 27. Peter Brown & Robert Mercer Renaissance Technologies 28. Lou Eccleston TMX Group 29. Peter Cherecwich Northern Trust Corp. 30. Mike Chinn S&P Global Market Intelligence

31. Chris Corrado London Stock Exchange Group 32. Neal Pawar AQR Capital Management 33. Gary Norcross Fidelity National Information Services 34. Steven O'Hanlon Numerix 35. Sebastián Ceria Axioma

36. Brian Conlon First Derivatives and Kx Systems 37. Tyler Kim MaplesFS 38. Michael Cooper BT Radianz 39. Robert Schifellite Broadridge Financial Solutions 40. Jim Minnick eVestment