Brait Merchant Bank has selected CCH Hosted Services as its partner for the establishment of a disaster recovery facility for its dealer room.
Andre Louw, risk manager at Brait Merchant Bank, says the company needs to ensure it can continue to operate as normal with a minimum level of disruption in case of a disaster such as fire, lightning strike, or a virus attack.
Brait Merchant Bank, which is capitalised to the value of more than R480 million, offers clients a full set of merchant banking services. These include trading in bonds, equity, derivatives and money market assets; a portfolio of investment banking services; and a spectrum of corporate lending services.
Downtime in the event of a disaster would expose the company to market volatility and open its clients up to risk.
"Uptime is critical to our relationships with our clients, who entrust us with their money," says Louw.
Brait`s deal with CCH Hosted Services also brings the company in line with the South African Reserve Bank`s strict requirements for banks to provide facilities for business continuity in the event of a disaster.
In the case of a disaster, Brait Merchant Bank`s team of dealers, administration staff and management will be able to resume work at CCH`s site with full access to Windows NT and Windows 95/98 workstations running their specialist pricing applications and data feeds from Safex, Reuters, and I-Net Bridge, says Andrew Sheldon, IT manager at Brait.
Louw says Brait`s research revealed that using an outsourcing partner to manage its business recovery site would far more cost-effective than installing its own redundant data lines and workstations.
After evaluating bids from a number of suppliers, Brait came to the conclusion that CCH Hosted Services had the best infrastructure and facilities for its needs. In addition, CCH Hosted Services provides similar services for other major South African banks, giving Brait confidence in the disaster recovery specialist`s abilities.
The two companies have just completed onsite testing of the systems, and Brait has reported its satisfaction with the results.
The Brait group is moving into new offices that will consolidate all of its operations under one roof. Brait is expected to consider expanding its business recovery agreement with CCH Hosted Services to incorporate its back-office infrastructure, including its Windows NT and Novell servers. "There is a strong drive towards good corporate governance, and consumers should be asking the financial institutions what their policies are in this regard. Those that have tested plans in place will gladly disclose that, and as for those that do not, clients should question if they are prepared to risk dealing with such an organisation," says CCH Hosted Services director Frederick Castleman.
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