< The 2015 Tech 50: Racers to the Edge

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Brian Sentance
Chief Executive Officer
Xenomorph Software
PNR
Big data didn’t go by that name — if it was even perceptible — in 1995, when Brian Sentance joined the founding team of Xenomorph Software. In 2015 the 35-employee, London-based company is as well placed as any to observe big data’s impact and help the financial industry turn the technology to its advantage. Sentance says Xenomorph got from there to here by understanding firms’ information-processing challenges, which, he contends, revolve around database capabilities as much today as they did two decades ago. “Problems with spreadsheets and data management may look different today,” the 49-year-old asserts, “but they are fundamentally the same problems.” They are complicated, however, by the sheer quantity of financial and market information; management demands for intraday or near-real-time risk reports; and tighter auditing, regulatory and compliance requirements. These largely postcrisis realities have driven adoption by top-tier financial institutions of Xenomorph’s TimeScape systems for enterprise data management, analysis and decision support, all enhanced by connections to data sources including Bloomberg, Markit and Thomson Reuters and by visualization aids like those of Aqumin and Tableau Software. “Our database model has always been very adaptable and agile and designed to enable new asset classes and product innovation,” says Sentance, pointing out how the architecture was built to last. Xenomorph’s and Sentance’s roots are in derivative markets — he headed a team at J.P. Morgan that developed pricing models for equity derivatives. In 1993, Sentance completed his Ph.D. in interest rate risk optimization at the Centre for Quantitative Finance, Imperial College London. His interest in joining Xenomorph was piqued when co-founder and chief technical architect Chris Budgen, formerly of Bankers Trust Co.’s equity and interest rate derivatives businesses, contacted Sentance seeking “knowledge of the business side to go along with the mathematics,” the CEO recalls.
See the full story, “The 2015 Tech 50: Racers to the Edge.”
The 2015 Tech 50
![]() Intercontinental Exchange ![]() Bank of America Corp. ![]() CME Group ![]() Markit ![]() BlackRock |
![]() Vlad Kliatchko Bloomberg ![]() Goldman Sachs Group ![]() Citi Ventures ![]() Fidelity Investments ![]() Nasdaq OMX Group |
![]() Thomson Reuters ![]() KCG Holdings ![]() ICAP ![]() Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. ![]() Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing |
![]() BATS Global Markets ![]() State Street Corp. ![]() London Stock Exchange Group ![]() Wells Fargo & Co. ![]() D.E. Shaw & Co. |
![]() Tradeweb Markets ![]() MarketAxess Holdings ![]() Liquidnet Holdings ![]() Capital One Financial Corp. ![]() First Data Corp. |
![]() Vanguard Group ![]() Citadel ![]() TMX Group ![]() Credit Suisse ![]() MSCI |
![]() DBS Bank ![]() Software AG ![]() BT Radianz ![]() Principal Financial Group ![]() trueEX Group |
![]() Deutsche BÖrse ![]() First Derivatives ![]() eVestment ![]() ![]() MaplesFS |
![]() Charles Schwab Corp. ![]() Numerix ![]() Axioma ![]() NRI Holdings America ![]() Xignite |
![]() OpenFin ![]() Xenomorph Software ![]() OpenGamma ![]() BNY Mellon Technology Solutions Group ![]() Perseus |
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