Turkish power Market at the ICCI in Istanbul.
IRM’s Sales Director, Günther Mai noted, “Our market model is set up to provide Turkish utility companies, market experts and analyst with a tool for fundamental price forecasting based on supply demand optimization - bringing them in a unique position to act quickly regarding changing requirements of this local market.” Mr. Mai went on to add, “Being able to deliver a system incl. proper market-data, mirroring the planned future Turkish balance areas – also allowing to model any scenario was the base idea behind IRM’s commitment to client-focused solutions for the Turkish market and related territories.”
“Turkey represents a large underserved region and is increasingly becoming a significant player in the global energy and commodities marketplace, and as a result, many of our clients have expressed an interest in expanding into this region,” commented Markus Seiser, CEO of IRM. Mr. Seiser further noted, “OpenLink/IRM continually has supported the expansion goals of our clients in multiple ways: by opening offices and creating partnerships worldwide for regional support, understanding local conventions and nuances, and offering solutions that support multiple markets and asset classes across the global marketplace.”
To learn more about IRM’S solutions for Energy & Commodities please visit: www.irm.at/en.
The software solution for the underlying project implementation was developed by IRM / OpenLink - the Austrian daughter company of OpenLink International and a predominant solutions provider to the global energy and commodities industry - and has no analogues in Russia. Furthermore it is the first successful ETRM (Energy Trading and Risk Management) project of its kind in Russia. Stins Coman is an exclusive partner for the delivery of iOPT solution in the power sector in Russia. At present the company has several implementation projects for the system in OREM related companies. One of the main issues successfully solved by Stins Coman and IRM experts was the adaptation of this solution to OREM specifics (regulations), translation into the Russian language and effective customization for JSC "INTER RAO UES", for tasks needed when operating in OREM, and for support in the area of export and import of electric energy.
“INTER RAO UES” company was one of the first in Russia who drew attention to the solution offered by “Stins Coman”, and noticed an opportunity for quality improvement and automation of their business processes in
• Planning and forecasting of results in trading activities,
• Optimization of generation equipment,
• Automation of RSV and VSVGO bids preparation,
• Aptimization of export and import operations for power and
• Contracts Portfolio / market risk management.
"I am pleased to note that one of the largest energy companies of Russia – INTER RAO UES- decided to implement a state of the art technology and innovative product solution such as IOPT, which is in use at more than 60 energy companies overall in the world” - said Bogdan Shatunov, Head of Energy Department of Stins Coman. -. “Owing to it, our specialists have been able to customize the most powerful product to Russian specificities in such a short period of time (7 months). One of the main challenges solved successfully by Stins Coman and IRM experts was the implementation of OREM (Specifics of the Russian Power markets) in Cyrilic language and customization of JSC "INTER RAO UES" specific business requirements“.
“Owing to the use of standardized, totally integrated software – iOPT system - we succeeded in rather diverse but relative tasks solution implementation in the scope of unified system, - said Gennady Semenov, Deputy Head of Trading Division, Project Manager of “INTER RAO UES”, - this is, of course, will have a positive effect on decision making efficiency, when operating in energy markets. It is also important to mention that one of the main results in this project have been the implementation of the technological platform, that will allow to implement further development of the system for the software package total potential reveal, offering by “Stins Coman”, and in ultimately short periods make adaptation to rapidly changing conditions of the Russian market.”
„This was our first project in Russia, therefore it was really important to show on the one hand the flexibility and capability of our product covering Russian market requirements and on the other hand to show that based on OpenLink/IRM professional project management and energy experts together with a strong and reliable partner we could deliver projects successfully on time in Russia”, said Markus Seiser, Managing Director of IRM.
OpenLink’s “Completeness of Vision” combined with “Ability to Execute” Evaluated in Magic Quadrant research
“We are pleased to be recognized as “Leader” based on Ability to Execute and Completeness of Vision,” stated Kevin Hesselbirg, OpenLink’s CEO. Mr. Hesselbirg went on to add, “In conjunction with our consulting and support services staff, our clients executed upon more than 250 go-live events during 2010 in the form of initial implementations, upgrades, and deployments of new modules or traded markets. Clients’ satisfaction with OpenLink was noted by the addition of 40 new clients, representing more than 2,000 new users to our C/ETRM platform and contributing to our more than 15% revenue growth. These new users to the OpenLink community further contributed to the largest market share in the industry and allowed us to pass a significant milestone of more than 20,000 worldwide users of our solutions.”
Dr. Wolfgang Ferse, EVP, Commodities & Energy Solutions noted, “We believe being acknowledged in the Leaders Quadrant is a compliment to our sophisticated pioneering clients and our talented and innovative development and implementation teams who work in unison to meet the challenging requirements of the markets we serve and continue to drive our strategic product development roadmap. Gartner’s comprehensive analysis illustrates the constantly evolving C/ETRM landscape and the commitment of the vendors who strive to achieve excellence.”
The Gartner Magic Quadrant positions vendors within a particular market segment based on their completeness of vision and their ability to execute on that vision. In the latest Magic Quadrant, the analysts evaluated 15 ETRM platform providers.
According to Gartner, vendors in the Leaders quadrant have “applications that cover all the core ETRM platform requirements for all traded commodities within energy markets, extending coverage in key areas, such as market and credit risk management, logistics or portfolio / asset optimization. These vendors have true global coverage, providing solutions to all major energy markets. In addition, these vendors demonstrate established relationships with complementary product and service providers in all regions, a well-defined corporate and marketing strategy, and strong financial viability.”
# # #
About The Magic Quadrant
The Magic Quadrant is copyrighted 2011 by Gartner, Inc. and is reused with permission. The Magic Quadrant is a graphical representation of a marketplace at and for a specific time period. It depicts Gartner’s analysis of how certain vendors measure against criteria for that marketplace, as defined by Gartner. Gartner does not endorse any vendor; product or service depicted in the Magic Quadrant, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors placed in the “Leaders” quadrant. The Magic Quadrant is intended solely as a research tool, and is not meant to be a specific guide to action. Gartner disclaims all warranties, express or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
About OpenLink
Founded in 1992, OpenLink is a provider of cross-asset trading, risk management, related operations processing and portfolio management software solutions for the commodity, energy and financial services markets globally.
OpenLink's client base of more than 350+ customers worldwide includes 12 of the top 25 largest commodity and energy companies by market capitalization, eight of the largest financial institutions and 11 of the largest central banks, as well as major hedge funds, commodities companies and public utilities.
Headquartered on Long Island, New York and with offices in New York City, Houston, London, Berlin, Vienna, São Paulo, Sydney, Singapore, Moscow and Toronto, OpenLink has more than 950+ employees worldwide.
Our team of Open Link/IRM, introduced the latest product developments of our leading systems solutions, namely endur – findur – iOPT.
This diversified range of products covers all requirements in the area of trading/risk management, portfolio management, forecast, optimization, operation/logistics for multi-commodity energy markets and the financial market in top- and middle-segments. As an essential product innovation the successful entrance into the Multi Commodity/Energy Sales area with our product iOPT _SALES was launched.
Our visitors were updated on the state of development at the 4 demo-stations. The outstanding collaboration of our software vendors and our newly gained referees within the past year within well known but also new markets – Russia - was praised on more than one occasion.
Please find below some impressions of our booth:
www.technic-group.com/video/e-world
Get to know us! We would be happy to welcome you this year at the following events:
Energy Trading Central & South Eastern Europe, June 08./09. – 10, 2010 in Warsaw
E-Mart, November 23./24, 2011 in Lyon
In addition, we are offering our clients the following event:
IRM User Group Meeting, October 19./21., 2011 in Vienna
New York, New York - December 2, 2010. Open Link Financial, Inc., (OpenLink), a leading provider of cross-asset trading, risk management and operations processing software solutions, announces today that they have been honored in the just published Commodity Business Awards as follows:
• Excellence in CTRM Software
• 2010 Best Vendor
• Best Knowledge in Market
The award was granted to the Commodity Trading & Risk Management (CTRM) specialist that has made a unique and substantial impact on commodity market trading efficiency and effectiveness – in the quality of trade execution, risk management and reporting. With pioneering solutions for grid, pipeline and bulk scheduling, as well as extensive capability to model risk simulations for physical scenarios using energy scenario management, OpenLink’s strategic goal has always been to provide businesses with leading edge CTRM tools.”
“OpenLink continues to be a leading innovator in the way commodity business is conducted, making a positive contribution to the development of this industry,” says Guy Isherwood, Awards Patron and Publisher/Editor of Commodities Now magazine. Mr. Isherwood added, “The Commodity Business Awards’ panel and industry voters, acknowledge that trading, investing, and managing assets and liabilities in today’s complex commodity sectors requires sophisticated, robust, adaptable and scalable technology, and OpenLink is the standout winner for 2010.”
Recently noted in a Commodities Now announcement, “OpenLink’s solutions provide support for operations from ‘source to sink’ for numerous commodity categories including coal, crude oil, refined products, gas, NGL, LNG, emissions and power. With the addition of dbc’s SMARTsoft to its product portfolio, (following the acquisition earlier this year) comprehensive support for agriculture and soft commodities is now possible. OpenLink also offers integrated optimization support through IRM’s iOPT for analysis and decision-making support. [IRM is an OpenLink company focused on structured procurement management, optimization, and investment analysis and planning].”
Kevin Hesselbirg, OpenLink’s CEO stated, “Over the last year, we have consistently seen commodity and energy trading become much more complicated and subject to increased risk and new variables. Our clients need to evaluate and monitor such additional variables as price differentials between the open market and stored commodities, physical constraints, inventory balances, and transportation options quickly and accurately. The evolution of the commodities market will continue to make trading more complex – requiring technology to supports real-time decisions and newly introduced variability. We appreciate that our growth strategy, which focuses on continued investments into multiple markets and geographies, is valued and yields an advantage to our clients.”
INTER RAO UES OJSC
Press Release
Vienna, Austria, October 12, 2010 – IRM, a leading solutions provider focused on structured procurement management, optimization, and investment analysis and planning, today announced that INTER RAO UES will implement their iOPT system for optimization, physical asset and portfolio management. IRM will support INTER RAO UES in its current power business and strengthen their overall position in Russia and abroad. IRM has opened a Moscow office to further support the Russian market.
INTER RAO UES will benefit from IRM’s acclaimed product support center for Russian- speaking clientele, and acquire qualitative improvement to the planning and forecasting aspect of their trading activity.
“It was important for us to establish a partnership with a leading vendor who brings along required international business expertise in different territories, knows the specifics of the Russian market very well, has demonstrated multiple successful implementations, delivers a system which supports our native language and is in the position to act quickly regarding the changing requirements of the local market,” said Vyacheslav Artamonov, Deputy CEO of INTER RAO UES. IRM, together with its local partner, StinsComan, won the project against strong regional and international competition.
“INTER RAO UES wanted a solution which would help them take advantage of trading opportunities in the Russian power markets, and secure their predominant status in the Russian energy market. As a result of this project, “INTER RAO UES” will benefit from a leading solution for commercial risks estimation, optimizing their export-import trade portfolio and its operation, have the ability to generate assets in electric power, and monitor their trading capacity on both the Russian and foreign markets business. These enhancements to their current trading activity provide a unique competitive advantage in the ever changing energy and commodity markets,” said Markus Seiser, CEO of IRM.
Presse Release
ABILITY TO PROVIDE LOCAL SUPPORT FOR GEOGRAPHICALLY DIVERSE CLIENT BASE, A DRIVER
Vienna, Austria, October 7, 2010 – IRM, a leading solutions provider focused on structured procurement management, optimization, and investment analysis and planning, today announced that it will open an office in Moscow, Russia. IRM will use this new office to organically expand their footprint in Russia and to other nearby eastern European territories, with a focus on providing local support for their expansive and geographically diverse client base.
IRM’s CEO, Markus Seiser noted, “Our acclaimed product support center is set up to provide Russian speaking experts, and is in a unique position to act quickly regarding changing requirements of this local market.” Mr. Seiser went on to add, “Being able to deliver a system with a Russian GUI was crucial to IRM’s commitment to client-focused solutions for the Russian and eastern European territories.”
“Russia represents a large underserved region and is increasingly becoming a significant player in the global energy and commodities marketplace, and as a result, many of our clients have expressed an interest in expanding into this region,” commented Kevin Hesselbirg, CEO of OpenLink. Mr. Hesselbirg further noted, “OpenLink continually has supported the expansion goals of our clients in multiple ways: by opening offices worldwide for regional support, understanding local conventions and nuances, and offering solutions that support multiple markets and asset classes across the global marketplace.”
CommodityPoint (Gary Vasey) visits IRM in Vienna
Three years after our company was acquired by OpenLink, Gary Vasey, director of CommodityPoint and opinion leader in the USA in the area of commodity trading and risk management, visited IRM to get a clear picture of the development of the company and its products.
He describes his very positive impressions in the CTRM Blog, published by CommodityPoint.
See the complete report of the industry insider at http://www.ctrmblog.com/2010/04/irm-revisited/.
Energy Trading Central & South Eastern Europe
As already announced in February, IRM will be represented at the Energy Trading Central & South Eastern Europe 2010 conference on June 9 to 10, 2010 together with OpenLink Berlin.
This important meeting for energy traders will take place at the “Hilton Warsaw Hotel and Convention Centre“. You will find us in the „Warsaw Hall“, booth no. 21. Catch up on the latest developments of our “iOPT“, “Endur“, and “Findur“ product groups and get to know our experts. For further information on this event go to www.ernergyreadingcsee.com.
Web Demo 01/2010
This year's first web demo introduced the new iOPT functionality “M2F evaluation, portfolio decomposition and optimization“ from Release 4.5.
Please contact Silvia Hammerschmiedt to order a description of the business case (silvia.hammerschmiedt@olf.com).
IRM Website in Russian
In connection with our business activities in Russia we are pleased to announce that our website is now also available in Russian. Together with our local partner StinComan we have created additional information material in Russian, which is available on the website. Visit us at www.irm.at, a short video clip provides information about our company.
Our team of Open Link Region Central Europe, represented by our offices in Berlin and IRM Vienna, introduced the latest product developments of our leading systems solutions, namely endur – findur – iOPT.
This diversified range of products covers all requirements in the area of trading/risk management, portfolio management, forecast, optimization, operation/logistics for multi-commodity energy markets and the financial market in top- and middle-segments.
Our visitors were updated on the state of development at the 4 demo-stations. The outstanding collaboration of our software vendors and our newly gained referees within the past year was praised on more than one occasion.
We would also like to invite you to view the television spot about us exhibiting at the E-world 2010 which will be broadcasted on n-tv on March 25, 2010 at 20:56. Alternatively, you may want to visit our homepage at www.irm.at accordingly, where you will also find a short spot about us.
Get to know us! We would be happy to welcome you this year at the following events:
Energy Trading Central & South Eastern Europe, June 9 – 10, 2010 in Warsaw
E-Mart, November 24 – 25, 2010 in Amsterdam
In addition, we are offering our clients the following event:
IRM User Group Meeting, September 15 – 17, 2010 in Vienna
At the same time, we worked intensively on the extension of our product range on the one hand, on the other, the number of IRM employees was increased to 115, thus providing the basis for our continuing attentive client care in the future.
In this vein and against all odds of the economic crisis, IRM managed to record a double-digit company growth.
For further details, please contact Silvia Hammerschmiedt (silvia.hammerschmiedt@olf.com).
Dr. Markus Seiser’s (Managing Director Central Europe, OpenLink Berlin and IRM Vienna) presentation “Multi-Commodity Risk and ScenarioManagment – Risk Assessment of Complex Contracts and Asset Portfolios“ has met exceptional interest.
IRM-solutions in the range of forecast, optimization and TimeSeriesManagement as well as interfaces and integration between iOPT and ENDUR, were presented in the form of speeches, hands-on-sessions and one-on-one discussions that had been directly fixed with prospective clients. Dr. Markus Seiser’s presentation (General Manager IRM/OpenLink Central & Eastern Europe) on “Decision Support for Traders & Planners“ produced particularly strong interest.
In addition, the synergy of our mother company OpenLink’s product ENDUR with our product was presented this year.
Our next UGM is scheduled for September 15 – 17, 2010 and we kindly ask you to make a note of this date.
“The participation in well-chosen, industry-specific events in Russia provides excellent opportunities for a continuous exchange of ideas on current issues with prospective buyers, partners and our clients.“ (Wolfgang Riedl – International Sales Manager, IRM)
For further details, please contact Silvia Hammerschmiedt (silvia.hammerschmiedt@olf.com).
• Further Commodities Portfoliomanagement (coal physical, wood)
• New Multi-Commodity Mark-to-Market
• Optimization: ModelingDesktop and Topology Editor
• ScenarioManagement
• CurveManager Redesign
• Flexible Invoicing
Our meeting commences on Wednesday with our tried and true “hands-on-session“. In the course of Thursday’s and Friday’s various presentations, our clients will be informed on innovations in our iOPT product range and other developments within our company.
We would be pleased to welcome many of our clients as our guests.
The main objective of our meeting was to convey the core area of expertise of both of our companies to a selected circle of prospective clients in the energy business. Presentations were given by Boris Granovsky (Vice President StinsComan) and Martin Bechtold (Sales Director IRM).
“Based on IRM’s long-standing experience in new energy markets and our successful project implementation, we were quickly able to customize our systems solution in collaboration with our partner StinsComan and adapt it to the local conditions of the Russian market“ (Martin Bechtold – Sales Director IRM).
The brisk interest in this event affirmed our decision to continue this discussion in a similar way in 2010.
The primary objective of this division is serving as a long-term contact point for all client matters with the exception of support queries. The Account Management is responsible for all existing clients currently receiving maintenance services.
The team is supervised and managed by Michaela Sommer and reports directly to the Managing Director.
For further details, please contact Silvia Hammerschmiedt (silvia.hammerschmiedt@olf.com).
The most significant new additions and further developments in this Release are i.e. the flexible and multi-client capable invoicing, an entirely novel M2M approach as well as the new ModelingDesktop including the TopologyEditor for optimization.
The initial talk given by Dr. Markus Seiser emphasized the internationally appreciated capacity and effectiveness of the iOPT product range with regard to the particularities of the Russian market.
The positive feedback that we received after our first WEB-demo inspired us to present the “Market Price Adapter” as a functionality available in Release 4.4.
For further details, please contact Silvia Hammerschmiedt (silvia.hammerschmiedt@olf.com).
We would like to point out to you again, that client infos such as newsletters, iOPT documentations as well as information on our client events etc. can be found in the Customer-LogIn-Section of our website. Clients will obtain their User-ID promptly via e-mail after requesting it (silvia.hammerschmiedt@olf.com).
Our team of Open Link Region Central Europe, represented by our Berlin office and IRM Vienna, introduced to many clients and interested visitors the tried and true features but also the new properties of our leading systems solutions, namely iOPT, ENDUR and FINDUR.
This range of products professionally and competently covers all requirements within the realms of trading/risk management, portfolio management, forecasting, optimization, operation/logistics for multi-commodity energy markets and the financial market in the top- and middle-tier segments.
Our visitors were updated on the further development of our range of products at 4 demo-stations. The outstanding collaboration between us, our partners and our newly gained referees within the past year impressed many.
Come visit us at one of the following events this year:
• Energy Risk Russia, May 19, 2009 in Moscow
• Energy Trading Central & South Eastern Europe, June 3 – 4, 2009 in Budapest
• E-Mart, November 18 -19, 2009 in Barcelona
• Oldenburger Gastage, Dezember 1 – 3, 2009 in Oldenburg
In addition, we are organizing the following events for our clients:
• IRM User Group Meeting, October 7 – 10, 2009 in Vienna
• OpenLink Worldwide User Conference, October 14 – 16, 2009 in Barcelona
For further details, please contact Silvia Hammerschmiedt (silvia.hammerschmiedt@olf.com).
Due to the increased interest in our WEB-demos at the E-World 2009, IRM is now offering them as part of its services. This technology lends itself perfectly to presenting new functions of our products in a fast and informative way. Our first WEB-demo treated the subject:
“Support for Intra-Day and Day-Ahead-Business“
The following functions were presented:
• graphical illustration
• pricing of spot bids
• generating PX-bids
The presentations were conducted by our experts Irina Reitgruber and Michaela Sommer.
For further details, please contact Silvia Hammerschmiedt silvia.hammerschmiedt@olf.com).