The 2016 Trading Technology 40: Rishi Nangalia

< The 2016 Trading Technology 40

23
Rishi Nangalia
Chief Executive Officer
REDI Holdings
Last year: 28

Technology has been a consistently strong suit for REDI Holdings, the Spear, Leeds & Kellogg institutional e-trading pioneer Goldman Sachs Group acquired in 2000 and spun off in 2013. But independence was complicated for CEO Rishi Nangalia. Because REDI was structured as a joint venture, the 40-year-old reports to multiple owners, including Goldman, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Citadel, while dealing with the growing pains of a virtual start-up and navigating the treacherous competitive landscape into which it was thrust. The good news is the financial services industry is warming up to the consortium model as a way to spread the costs and lower the risks of innovation, and REDI has worked out the kinks. “The open and collaborative nature of our platform stands REDI apart from other fintech firms,” says Nangalia, who started with Goldman’s e-trading team in 2001 and spent two years methodically planning the joint venture’s launch in July 2013. “We think we’re on the cusp of bringing some exciting new technologies to Wall Street,” the CEO says. Nangalia sees REDI as a bridge between established entities and technologies and new players like OpenFin, developer of cross-platform desktop software using the HTML5 language, and enterprise mobile app company PowWow. “Unlike other industries, fintech requires start-ups to work with incumbents to drive true change and innovation,” Nangalia notes. New-tech cultures prize openness and sharing, which historically would have clashed with the proprietary attitudes of traditional finance. But with banks showing signs of becoming more collaborative, Nangalia believes vendors should be too, for their clients’ benefit. His team is currently building an open, collaborative, cloud-based platform; mobile products for iOS; and middle-office enhancements he dubs “OMS [order management system] lite.”

2016 Trading Technology 40