When Ireland's leading bank, Allied Irish Bank (AIB), is disposing of the Windows PCs that its tellers used on their desktops in favour of Linux-based terminals, analysts said an IT insurgency was emerging in the financial services sector.
AIB, based in Dublin, signed a deal with Sun Microsystems to move the desktop computers of its 7,500 branches to the Linux-based Java Desktop System (JDS), Release 2.
Working with a local partner, Horizon Open Systems and Sun will bring the systems online in Ireland and UK by the end of next year, according to Sun. JDS will power terminals being installed as part of the bank's new branch banking platform, which will be the tellers' interface with all banking applications.
The Irish bank serves many rural communities, and the small businesses there have a need for speed in customer services just like larger firms. "It is imperative that financial institutions assist farmers to grow and develop," says Michael Dowling, head of agricultural strategy at AIB.
The Linux-based desktop systems could banks such as AIB to accomplish that in a number of ways.
For fixed-function applications, like the work that tellers do, Linux could be ideal to slash deployment and operating costs. The bank can standardise on x86 servers with Linux, which will ease administration woes. The user does not need a lot of flexibility, since they will use only a core banking application and a free office suite, such as Open Office during the working hours. Even security isn't a concern, since Linux doesn't have any major worrisome virus or spyware issues.
Banks like AIB could well be paving the way for Linux desktops.
Whos running Linux?
- Credit Suisse First Bostons Agora Trading System runs on Linux
- Morgan Stanley runs 1,000 servers on the platform
- Lehman Brothers trading and risk analytics run on Linux
- Schwab runs its Velocity trading system on Linux
- Goldman Sachs has multiple proprietary software applications supporting trading on the platform
- Dresdner Bank runs risk applications on it; and Charles Schwab converted Schwab.com to Linux in June.
- Chicago Mercantile Exchange runs off Linux
- Jordan Commercial Bank powers its 23 branches on Linux
- Habib Bank Zurich runs its entire infrastructure on Linux
- Standard Chartered Dubai, Emirates Bank International run specific departments off Linux
- E-Trade Financial and Citigroup run a large chunk of their infrastructure on Linux
- NYSEs Linux system TradeWorks handles 1.6 billion shares traded daily
- Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein runs its portfolio risk management on Linux, using 80 Intel-based xSeries 4000R servers deployed in Linux clusters
- State Street runs IBM's DB2 on Linux
- Nasdaq Stock Market has scraped its proprietary SuperMontage order entry and execution system in favor of an open-source system from electronic broker Instinet
- Plus Finanzservice GmbH, one of Germany's biggest financial services companies has migrated its core Web services infrastructure to Linux
- Ireland's leading bank, Allied Irish Bank (AIB) is migrating its desktops in 7500 branches to Suns Linux based desktop system (JDS)
Banker Middle East 2005
