NEW YORK, April 19, 2000 — Today at the Financial Summit, Microsoft Corp. announced that enterprise leaders in the securities and banking industries have rapidly moved to adopt the Microsoft® Windows® 2000 operating system, allowing them to expand their services and operations to meet increasing market demands. Financial Services leaders are addressing the needs of their global, multinational customers while increasing their revenue opportunities and expanding their personalized customer services by utilizing the Windows 2000 platform.
Business leaders such as Credit Suisse First Boston, Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc., Wells Fargo Bank and the SWX Swiss Exchange are leading the way in developing innovative solutions that utilize the Windows 2000 platform to streamline their business functions and enhance customer service.
“Windows 2000 offers incredible opportunities for financial services companies to deliver the highest levels of value and service,”
said Steve Ballmer, president and CEO of Microsoft.
“We are proud of the success that industry leaders like Wells Fargo, Credit Suisse First Boston and Merrill Lynch are experiencing on our platform. We look forward to deepening our relationships with other customers in the financial services industry to enable them to better serve their customers and compete more effectively.”
Meeting the Challenges of Global, Multinational Organizations
Credit Suisse First Boston, a leading global investment banking firm with 60 sites in 30 countries, is deploying Windows 2000 on more than 17,000 desktops and 2,500 laptops and plans to standardize its operating system to the Windows 2000 platform. The multilingual capabilities of Windows 2000 are helping Credit Suisse First Boston address the needs of its key customers by expanding services and supporting different languages for internal users.
“Credit Suisse First Boston is committed to using Windows 2000 as our standard platform because it provides us with the tools to further expand our global reach while maintaining our high standards for customer service,”
said Steve Long, co-CIO of Credit Suisse First Boston.
“The multilingual features in Windows 2000 have allowed us to standardize on a consistent framework worldwide, and, in addition, provide our clients with the flexibility of choosing their preferred language no matter where they travel. Windows 2000 has allowed us to create a win-win situation where employee productivity is increased and IT costs are reduced.”
Expanding Personalized Customer Services With Windows 2000
Full-service investment firms such as Merrill Lynch are realizing the need to broaden their service offerings and respond quickly to changing customer needs and market demands. To address these challenges, Merrill Lynch is deploying Windows 2000 Professional,
Windows 2000 Server and Windows 2000 Advanced Server to the more than 700 branch offices and 13,600 financial consultants throughout the United States that make up its Private Client Group.
Windows 2000 allows Merrill Lynch to reuse more components in multiple applications, minimizing the amount of work that has to be done to release a new application and deliver enhanced customer services.
“The reliability, flexibility and centralized administration in Windows 2000 will enable us to efficiently provide our financial consultants with new tools, so we can maintain a high level of quality and deploy new applications and services far more easily than before,”
said Adam Schoenfield, director of Distributed Systems Development, Private Client Architecture Group, Merrill Lynch.
Windows 2000 Increases Revenue Opportunities for Securities Institutions
The SWX Swiss Exchange ranks among the world’s leading securities exchanges, bringing investors and issuers together in a liquid and efficient securities market. To maintain its technological leadership, SWX needs to ensure that its applications offer high performance and uncompromising security, as well as be easy to upgrade and maintain. SWX’s current UNIX-based trading system has proven reliable, but to occupy a leading position in the competitive global exchange environment, SWX is adding the Windows 2000 platform.
SWX and Microsoft have developed the reference architecture for a new electronic trading system called the Trading New Architecture, based on the Microsoft Windows DNA platform, using Microsoft Windows 2000 and Microsoft SQL Server TM 7.0. The Trading New Architecture will expand customer services provided by SWX because it allows for full integration of the exchange participants’ own trading room applications. It will also serve as the basis for future developments, such as further expansion of trade through the Internet and the creation of networks with other exchanges.
Increasing Customer Benefits by Boosting Productivity
Wells Fargo is the nation’s seventh largest bank, and as a product of more than 1,500 mergers in 147 years it has become a highly decentralized financial services company. To meet its diverse IT challenges, it plans to migrate its Microsoft Windows NT® Server 4.0-based infrastructure to the Windows 2000 operating system and utilize the Microsoft Active Directory TM service.
“It’s easier to deploy new applications on the Windows 2000 platform,”
said Scott Hall, enterprise architecture manager for Wells Fargo Services Co.
“Windows 2000 allows us to design our network directory according to our business needs, instead of mapping our business to a predefined architecture. Windows 2000 will enable us to reduce the cost of administration while allowing for greater flexibility and increased productivity, which will ultimately benefit the customer.”
About Windows 2000 and Microsoft
Windows 2000 Professional and Windows 2000 Server products lower the total cost of ownership and provide a rich digital infrastructure for organizations of all sizes. In-depth technical and deployment planning information on Windows 2000 is available at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ .
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq
“MSFT”
) is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people through great software – any time, any place and on any device.
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