NEWS BRIEFS
Houston, TEXAS — Compaq Computer Corporation announced that Archipelago, a leading United States-based electronic communications network (ECN), has agreed to purchase more than 1,500 Compaq ProLiant servers.
According to Archipelago, this will create the world’s first fully electronic national stock exchange and revolutionize stock trading as we know it today. “Our intent is to provide a quantum change in the way the market conducts everyday business, enabled by technology, dovetails precisely with Compaq’s world-class capability to provide the best-of-breed servers and storage infrastructure,” said Buddy Meek, Archipelago’s Chief Information Officer. “In particular, we are impressed by the demonstrated reliability of Compaq’s ProLiant line that is crucial in enabling us to meet our mission-critical daily needs in keeping our customers trading.”
Archipelago, with a current volume of more than 80 million shares per day, and the Pacific Exchange, the third most active stock exchange in the country with a volume averaging nearly 25 million shares each day, announced the formation of the Archipelago Exchange in July. Pending regulatory approval by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Archipelago Exchange will provide its professional trading participants with a fully automated trading platform for New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), American Stock Exchange (Amex) and Nasdaq stocks.
At the heart of the planned Archipelago Exchange, and Archipelago’s ability to provide the best execution for its investors, are Compaq servers and services. Some 1,500 Compaq ProLiant DL 580, ML570 and DL360 servers have either been ordered or will be by the end of the year to provide processor, memory, storage and networking capabilities for Archipelago’s two data centers in New York City and Chicago.
“Our business relationship with Archipelago exemplifies Compaq’s strategic direction to provide leadership in Internet infrastructure,” said Bill Weaver, Great Lakes Region Vice President for Compaq. “Our ProLiant servers, with their solid reputation for reliability, will be at the heart of the Archipelago Exchange’s thrust to open alternative trading avenues with better direct access to the twenty-first century stock markets.”
Archipelago was formed in December 1996 with software developer Townsend Analytics. It is one of the original four Electronic Communications Networks (ECNs) approved in January 1997 by the SEC. Archipelago offers trading in listed and Nasdaq stocks. The Archipelago trading system provides investors fast, cost-efficient and anonymous access to the market. Its average daily volume more than tripled since June 1999. For more information, see http://www.tradearca.com .
Compaq Computer Corporation, a Fortune Global 100 company, is one of the largest suppliers of computing systems in the world. Compaq designs, develops, manufactures and markets hardware, software, solutions and services, including industry-leading enterprise computing solutions, fault-tolerant business-critical solutions and communications products, commercial desktop and portable products, and consumer PCs. Compaq markets its products and services primarily to customers from the business, home, government and education sectors. Customer support and information about Compaq and its products and services are available at http://www.compaq.com .
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