By Peter Monks, VP of Technology at Symphony Software Foundation, as presented at All Things Open 2017.

1. @symphonyoss
symphony.foundation
Strangers in a Strange Land
Open Source in Financial Services
Peter Monks
VP of Technology

2. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
1. The Symphony Software Foundation
2. The Open Source developer landscape
3. The FinServ developer landscape
4. How we can bring these communities together?
Agenda

3. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● Fosters the open ecosystem of
the Symphony platform
▸ Symphony is a chat /
messaging platform for
regulated industries
(specifically investment
banking)
● As a result, we work almost
exclusively with large FinServ &
FinTech firms
Overview of the Foundation

4. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Our Community
By The Numbers
~50 Open Source Projects
300+ Active Contributors
4 Active Working Groups
27 Member Organizations
2 Individual Members

5. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Open Source Developer Landscape

6. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Open Source Developer Landscape
● Do you rely on one or more of these kinds of services to do your job?
● Would you be able to do your job without access to any of them?

7. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Open Source Developer Landscape
● Do you rely on one or more of these kinds of services to do your job?
● Would you be able to do your job without access to any of them?
● That’s the environment most FinServ developers work in!

8. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
To understand why this is, we must
first understand the Financial Services
industry more generally.

9. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● Trading is increasingly
automated
▸ Confers competitive advantage
● Low latency and high
throughput are key
▸ Market transactions routinely
complete in < 10ms
▸ This is bumping into physics
(e.g. light travels a mere 1900
miles in that time!)
FinServ is a real time business

10. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● Financial Services has always
been highly regulated
● But since 2009 (GFC) regulation
has markedly increased
● Society has decided that
unregulated banking (and the
boom / bust cycles that that
creates) is unacceptable
Highly regulated

11. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● FinServ is fundamentally an
information business
● Preventing information (data,
intellectual property) loss is
therefore a paramount priority
Information loss is a primary risk

12. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● As a result of this, surveillance of
employee activity is ubiquitous
▸ This helps ensure compliance
with both regulations and
policies
Note: this is not a secret or in any way nefarious - all
firm employees are fully briefed on their firm’s
surveillance policies when they join.
Ubiquitous surveillance

13. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● Locked down development environments
● Internet services are blocked by default
▸ Exceptions involve bureaucratic approval processes
● All internet access is surveilled
▸ IP & DLP analysis
▸ Fraud, collusion, bribery detection
● Compliance violations are often a fireable offense
Financial Services Developer Landscape

14. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● Locked down development environments
● Internet services are blocked by default
▸ Exceptions involve bureaucratic approval processes
● All internet access is surveilled
▸ IP & DLP analysis
▸ Fraud, collusion, bribery detection
● Compliance violations are often a fireable offense
● As a result, firm employees:
▸ rarely have access to open source infrastructure
▸ are reserved when in those arenas
Financial Services Developer Landscape

15. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
This is at odds with most
open source communities!

16. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Strangers in a Strange Land?
So where does this leave the open
source movement?
Is there really an opportunity to
engage and embrace FinServ
developers?

17. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Absolutely!

18. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Absolutely!
In fact the banks themselves
are driving this change!

19. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● Because they understand that:
▸ software is key to competing in an information industry
▸ open source is a key engine of software innovation
■ They clearly see this when:
● they compete for talent with Research Triangle, Silicon Valley, Silicon Alley, Silicon
Roundabout, Silicon Hills, etc.
● they interact with (more agile) FinTech startups
● their developers lose productivity by reinventing wheels
● Banks employ 10,000s of highly skilled developers
▸ These developers are increasingly from the “GitHub Generation”, who
grew up with Open Source as a given
▸ We want this massive community to fully participate in open source!
Banks are driving this change

20. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
● Be aware and tolerant of FinServ developer traits
● Make your projects FinServ friendly
▸ Consider surveillance requirements
▸ Implement security standards (e.g. SAML)
● Be patient!
▸ This is cultural change, and that’s never fast!
● Help us out!
▸ This has become a major focus for us, and it’s not Symphony-specific!
▸ In typical open source fashion, we are very keen to pool our efforts!
How you can help

21. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
What is the Foundation doing?

22. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Open Source Readiness Program
Value
Friction
Legal
IP ownership,
inbound & outbound
licensing, …
Cultural
Transparency,
inclusiveness,
conduct, …
Technical
OSS Supply chain,
DevOps Workflows
Why
Open Source?
Strategic value of OSS -
innovation, talent, …
What to
Open Source?
OSS commercialization tactics,
open core “value line”, …
OpenSourceReadiness
WorkingGroup
OpenDeveloperPlatform
Legal / Compliance / Security
Business Units / IT

23. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Business, legal & compliance peace of mind
High fidelity developer experience
Open Developer Platform
A trusted sandbox for open source inter-firm collaboration
FREE for all open source contributors!
info.symphony.foundation/open-developer-platform
Symphony
(REST API)
Symphony
(Extension API)
Symphony
(Integrations Bridge)
Plexus Add Your API
Add Your
Data
Dev
Biz
Code
hosting
(GitHub)
Continuous
Integration
(Travis CI)
Security, Quality, IP
Compliance
(WhiteSource, SonarQube, Coverity)
Cloud
Continuous
Delivery
(OpenShift)
Artifact
Publishing
(Maven central, npm,
NuGet, PyPi, Clojars)

24. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Open Source Readiness Working Group
Desktop Containers
(Minuet, SymphonyElectron, ContainerJS,
…)
Desktop
Container
WG
API
WG
Extension API
Symphony Platform
REST APIs
Integrations
(SFDC, Zapier, JIRA, GitHub, …)
Apps
(RFQ, Angular, …)
App SamplesIntegration Bridge
Bots
(HelpDesk, Vote, Unfurl,
…)
Clients
(Java, .NET, Python, JS, Clojure …)
Swagger API Spec
FinancialObjects
StandardizationWG
OpenSourceReadinessWG
Plexus
Legend
Proprietary
Working Group
Open Source

25. @symphonyosssymphony.foundation
Nov 8, 2017
@ BNY Mellon
New York, NY
Featuring speakers from:
● JP Morgan
● IHS Markit
● Goldman Sachs
● Google
● Morgan Stanley
● Deutsche Bank
● The Linux Foundation
● GitHub
● NodeSource
● RedHat
Open source collaboration will power the next wave
of innovation in financial services.
What’s your open source strategy?
opensourcestrategyforum.org
Leave your business card at booth #66 to be in the
running for free tickets!

26. Thanks!
@symphonyoss
symphony.foundation
Booth #66