Sanjib Sahoo, Chief Technology Officer, tradeMONSTER

SuperNova Award Category

Technology Optimization & Innovation

The Company

tradeMONSTER is one of the top online retail brokerages in North America. (Barron’s Ranking 2013: @ on.barrons.com/15P49ZJ).

tradeMONSTER has set a new standard of innovation and excellence in the online brokerage industry since it was launched in 2008 and has been known as disruptors in online trading industry.

The Problem

tradeMONSTER’s award-winning desktop platform, comprised of option trading tools were not available on the mobile platform until 2013 and led to unhappy customers and new customers not opening accounts.

Moreover, the flex platform did not work on  iPads at all which made us lose customers using tablets and making us lose the reputation of being able to let our customers trade “Anywhere,Anytime”, a concept which we introduced first in the industry.
We needed a mobile app strategy that will be low-cost development, easy maintenance, optimized for 3g,4g,wireless networks and help to standardize all our platforms since mobile is not our primary business line.

The Solution

In Feb. 2013,we launched our new mobile trading platform using HTML5 with native wrappers.

Complete native strategy did not work for us primarily due to cost of development and maintenance, the app store update process (5-7 days does not work in the agile trading industry where every millisecond of production outages cause financial exposures) and to standardize the web experience for our users across all devices.

The iPAD app( which can mimic upto 4 trading apps in one iPAD)and the mobile all uses our custom built patent-pending HTML5 framework that solves several bandwidth and security issues, connectivity issues and stream 8 billion quotes during a 6.5 hour trading day on these devices.

The Results

tradeMONSTER two times now has disrupted the trading industry, first with streaming browser based trading platform and now with the first HTML5 mobile trading platform and a subsequent multi-screen, uniquely customizable industry-first  full-fledged IPAD trading app and making mobility our focus and key strategy for the last one year.

This solution has also been a use case for the technology and business industry demonstrating how an HTML5 app strategy used effectively can return better gains and help company stay competitive and gain advantage in the long term.

Providing the same and even better user experience on the mobile and tablets as our desktop web platform and enabling traders with desktop power on the go, we have been able to raise the bar for customer  experience for traders in the industry

The Technology:

tradeMONSTER Mobile Elite, tradeMONSTER Tablet, tradeMONSTER

Metrics

  • We saved about 7 times the cost of development and maintenance had we taken a native app strategy.
  • 15% of all total users who login to the tradeMONSTER platform now login and use tradeMONSTER Mobile.
  • Since its launch in February to date, the mobile platform (including the iPad app) had 100,000+ user logins.
  • Gross Commissions from the iPad app alone have increased at an average of 105% every month making it a business strategy for us.
  • Revenue trades submitted through IPAD since launch in Feb have increased at an average of 86% every month
  • About 3,000,000 shares have been traded with tradeMONSTER mobile.
  • About 5% of the total orders from tradeMONSTER customers now come from mobile already within few months of launch.
  • The logins to the tradeMONSTER mobile has increased at an average of 45% every month.
  • The orders submitted through tradeMONSTER mobile have increased at an average of 50% every month since its launch in February.
  • Contracts traded through tradeMONSTER mobile have increased at an average of 66% every month since its launch in February.

Disruptive Factor

This is the first HTML5 mobile trading platform in the US trading industry; when Facebook and LinkedIn have moved away from HTML5,we could have gone a safer route of native, but with the belief that “web is alive”, we demonstrated the power of HTML5 in the most mission critical performance-intrinsic trading industry and solved performance, security and stability issues with HTML5.
 

The iPad version has unique customization features that brings multi-screen desktop capability on an iPad, a game changer in the trading industry.( http://ubm.io/1cvt6uG) defining new heights of user experience.

Several professional grade trading tools (primarily for options ) requiring complex computations are now available in the mobile app giving traders the desktop power on the go and bringing rich user experience “Anywhere, Anytime.” defining the new era in online trading.

Shining Moment

  • Barrons ranked our mobile app the best in the North American Trading industry and stated “this is a terrific, comprehensive platform” and ranked 4.9 out of 5. http://bit.ly/XG16Bc and helping to make us the top 2 brokers in the USA.(http://bit.ly/ZE2GBf)
  • techCrunch(http://tcrn.ch/1esW2En) and BusinessInsider(http://read.bi/11ewtpe) used our app as an example to compare HTML5 with native and demonstrate what HTML5 can do.
  • WallStreet Technology wrote several articles on how this app(http://ubm.io/1cvt6uG) and especially the iPad app is changing WallStreet and demonstrating the bleak future of PCs(http://ubm.io/1cvt6uG). Other media like Citeworld, Crain’s, NBC Chicago, CDW, Wired and even a book on HTML5 has talked about our app and approach.
  • One of our customers gave a feedback about our mobile “ This is even better than the web platform. Kudos to tradeMONSTER”.
  • Forbes recognized us as a technology disruptor after this mobile innovation, and Sanjib Sahoo, CTO was awarded 2013 CIO of the year, mainly for this innovation(http://on.wsj.com/19aZ9Uv ) . Our development team won the ITA Citylights award for this mobile innovation.
  • Our strategy is considered as the primary example for the Hybrid Apps community starting on October 1.
  • Currently a Harvard Business Review case study is in progress for this app  and how it broke myths and redefined an industry .  Our mobile case study has been and will be presented in several national/international conferences.

 

About tradeMONSTER

tradeMONSTER (www.tradeMONSTER.com) is one of the top online retail brokerages in North America and has set a new standard of innovation and excellence for the industry since it was launched in 2008. It has become a major disruptor in trading technology while also emerging as the industry’s leader in user experience, as reflected by the "Best for Options Traders" designation by Barron’s for the fourth consecutive year. tradeMONSTER was the first online broker to deploy a streaming desktop-like trading experience in a web-browser, featuring professional grade tools in a dynamic and customizable interface combined with integrated investor education, transparent commissions and an extremely knowledgeable and dedicated customer service team. 

Additionally, tradeMONSTER is offering a groundbreaking mobile experience on all major mobile platforms and devices through tradeMONSTER Mobile. In June, tradeMONSTER released its widely anticipated iPad app, the first HTML5-based iPad app (patent pending) in the online brokerage industry, offering a full range of tradeMONSTER’s trading tools: http://bit.ly/19KY1Uz

tradeMONSTER's technology team prides itself on constant customer driven innovation and has been granted several patents for its technology and one-of-kind investment tools embedded on the tradeMONSTER platform. All securities and investments are offered through tradeMONSTER. Member FINRA/SIPC/NFA.