Open Source Grid Computing in the Finance Industry Alex Efimov STFC Kite Club

1. Open Source Grid Computing in the Finance Industry Alex Efimov STFC Kite Club Knowledge Exchange Advisor UK CERN Technology Transfer Officer Alex.efimov@stfc.ac.uk +44 (0)1223 422405

2. STFC Introduction • The STFC was formed on 1 April 2007 by the merger of the Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council (PPARC) and the Council for the Central Laboratory of the Research Councils (CCLRC) • It is one of seven national research councils in the UK. • Annual budget is around £600m: • funds the best research within in particle physics, astronomy, nuclear physics and space science; • enables the research community to have access to the best facilities in the world; • increases the UK technology capability, engagement with industry and knowledge transfer.

3. gLite Commercialisation Project STFC helps to overcome the following problems • High costs of establishing a partnership • Asymmetric information flows • Differences between scientific and business cultures • Insufficient level of market level readiness • Lack of skills and experience • Equity gap

4. Constellation Technologies Ltd, registered in October 2007 in the UK A spin-off company from STFC Based at Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL) Develops and distributes the computer virtualization solutions based on gLite Grid middleware Employs IT experts from CERN and UK universities Contact: Nick Trigg, N.P.Trigg@rl.ac.uk, CLIK/RAL Constellation Technologies, Ltd. will provide following commercial services: Commercial technical support and training Develop and distribute commercial enterprise and global solutions based on the gLite middleware Technical consultancy to software vendors and end-users Build commercial e-Infrastructure based on gLite and offer it on pay-as-you-use basis (Utility Computing Model) Constellation Technologies Ltd

5. Grid in Finance: Current Status • Vast majority of large financial institutions use Grid • The largest share of the market (around 75%) DataSynapse and Platform • Open source presence (Condor) is negligible Proprietary vendors know better what customers in the financial industry need

6. Infrastructure Level Reducing overheads Improving manageability Planning and flexibility Application Level Risk Management Portfolio Management Derivatives Pricing Transactional activities Grid in Finance

7. Facing New Challenges • Complexity of modern IT infrastructures: physical servers, virtual machines, clusters, Grids, geographical distribution • Cost of electricity • Credit crunch • Further pressures to reduce costs • Openness to the acceptable security concept

8. Bank 1 Around 30k computers in more than 10 data centres Decentralised IT: resources belong to departments Use DataSynapse: more than 200 Grids Want to try virtualisation Bank 2 Around 20k computers in 9 data centres Centralised IT: all users are on hard SLAs Use Platform and Condor Little or no interest in virtualisation Case Studies

9. Finding Solutions • Improving utilisation rates through market based algorithms for resource allocation • Accessing external infrastructures on-demand • Using a single management platform for all computing resources • Opportunity for gLite

10. gLite for Finance • Grant Reference: ST/G000263/1 • Principal Investigator: Dr Neil Geddes, STFC (RAL) • Project Title: Industrial research to integrate gLite (Grid software) into a platform for the commercial trading of computer resources • Funds Awarded: £198,791.11

11. Improving Utilization 100% Cloud Computing: (+) no need to own hardware, shared access, improved utilisation through pay-as-you-use (-) incompatible platforms, ‘fair price’ is dubious to users Enterprise/Departmental Grid: (+) improves utilisation rates of physical servers, enables collaboration (-) limited scalability, lack of interoperability between vendors, limited efficiency of policy based mechanisms Utilisation Grid Virtual Servers: (+) improved utilisation rates, better scalability, easy disaster recovery (-) increased number of servers to manage, incompatible virtualization platforms Hardware Servers: (-) low utilisation rates, scalability problems 0%

12. gLite Architecture for Finance Input files Datasets info Output files Resource info Job Submit Event Job Query Publish Job Status Storage Resource Offer Demand File Catalogue VRM User/Grid interface Information Service Resource Broker Input Output Author. &Authen. Computing Resource Logging & Book-keeping Job Status

13. Competition Interfaces and Market Mechanisms ConstellationTechnologies • Key differentiators: • Open source – no vendor lock-in • Scalability Interfaces Creates pools of resourcesHigher utilisation rates Cloud Incompatible Standards EnterpriseCloud EnterpriseGrid Incompatible Standards Virtualisation OperatingSystem Hardware

14. STFC Funding for Partnerships PIPSS Features • Maximum STFC contribution: £125k per year • Maximum project duration: 3 years • Calls: quarterly Mini-PIPSS Features • Maximum STFC contribution : £110k per year • Maximum project duration: 12 months • Calls: applications may be made at any time

15. Technology Transfer • How to get involved: • Apply for Mini-PIPSS and PIPSS grant • Consultancy projects with industry • Constellation Technology Ltd is looking for people with gLite knowledge and programming skills