Harco Technology announces a major extension to its Data Access and Reporting Tool (DART) market data usage analysis and cost optimisation application.

Existing users and new clients for the Harco system will now be able to perform "product best fit analysis" to identify the appropriate Reuter product for a trader based on the exchange, specialist service and other information viewed at the trading desk. Market Data Managers can now use the Harco Data Access and Reporting Tool (DART) to identify the appropriate number of "Securities", "Treasuries" or "Markets" licenses for their organisation.

"We are very pleased to offer this functionality'' says Stuart Harvey, Director, Harco Technology. "DART can now rapidly and accurately identify the most economical product for a user based on their actual consumption of market data. Vendors are increasingly selling information in packages or products. Our existing DACS and TIB clients have been asking for a means to help simplify the complex task of product selection. We have several customers hoping to use our product to accurately select the "International", "UK Domestic" or "European" products available with the new Reuters 3000Xtra service".

"We have worked hard to integrate this new functionality into the existing product", says Steve Cowler a co-founder of the firm. "The latest release builds on our model of rapid usage analysis and clearly shows the cost impact of over-permissioned and unused services". Cowler also states "Our current sites are using the product best fit capabilities mainly to aid in the identification of Reuter products. However, this functionality is appropriate for any vendor packaging and selling information at various tariff levels".

Initial client testing involved two large customers - one in London and one in New York. Both clients were impressed with the ability of the product to improve the accuracy of matching users to the appropriate Reuter product and moved quickly to use the software for analysis of product requirements on operational trading floors.

Harco Technology has seen a trend in the marketplace where banks want to supplement their cost inventory and recharge systems with software that will allow rapid reporting and analysis of what data a trader actually looks at. Harco's DART product has been adopted by a number of major financial organisations as a key tool in the ongoing process of cost optimisation. Harco's product is used to manage some thirty trading floors in Europe, America and the Asia Pacific region. The company numbers five of the world's top ten international banks as customers.

Market data cost transparency has become an increasingly topical area for banks as they deploy global operations and consider methods of redistributing financial information on the internet. Harco's Data Access and Reporting Tool is widely used to monitor and apportion costs for data delivered on the popular Reuters Triarch and Tibco platforms.

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