As of October 1, 2022, PEAK6 NI has officially become Apex Fintech Solutions UK.
“As Apex Fintech Solutions UK, we’re merely tightening the definition of what a visionary technology company is all about,” explains Lisa Stevenson, Site Lead and VP of Engineering at Apex Fintech Solutions UK. “We’re still focused on the same tech-driven initiatives. We’ll always be recruiting top-tier talent. We’re simply identifying as a unit underneath the Apex name.”
Apex Fintech Solutions, a PEAK6 company, is a market leading, technologically independent software company that aims to provide safe, frictionless digital execution, clearing, and storage for the global universe of investable assets. What drives Apex is creating independence that produces ownership of the data used to build community, increases financial literacy, and eliminates barriers to economic opportunities for the next generation of digital wealth creation.
With the support from Invest Northern Ireland, it’s fitting that PEAK6 NI has updated its name to Apex Fintech Solutions UK. Through Invest NI, Belfast has developed a strong tech and financial sector with many Foreign Direct Investments.
The City of Belfast has been a boon for the Apex talent lineup. On top of the pool of skills each member brings, the team in Northern Ireland helps Apex, based in the United States, bridge the “follow the sun” model. By having teams across global time zones, Apex keeps thought, innovation, and industry breakthroughs moving, extending a day’s operations from nine hours to 18. It’s also increased support for the business areas that need to be covered 24/7.
“The Apex Belfast team enables our company to be market ready for our clients by leveraging our time zones,” says Clark Litster, Senior Talent Acquisition Specialist. “Apex technology powers more than 220 clients and over 22 million end investors. With that much at stake, we augment our U.S. team by up to one third by supporting all aspects of the Apex business. And because of the efforts by Invest NI, the competition for local talent is fierce. Apex needs to stand out in the market, and we do.”
Extraordinary individuals in remarkable communities
Apex teams don’t look like your everyday tech and finance teams. They are margin analysts, client experience middle office specialists, and operations specialists within banking, treasury, and wealth management. And, of course, they have the region’s leading coders, engineers, and developers.
Stevenson was hired to build the Belfast office from scratch in March 2020, right when the pandemic shutdowns began. She hired and onboarded PEAK6 NI's first 40 people throughout the lockdowns.
“We looked for people who weren’t afraid to disrupt the status quo. People looking for something new, something better, something worth their remarkable talents,” says Stevenson.
She curated a team who ultimately understand how to work as a crossfunctional team, are positive, collaborative, and possess a keen understanding of the latest tech stacks and technologies.
In two years, the Apex Fintech Solutions UK staff has grown to almost 100, with more coming in. They benefit from working with their American counterparts — learning other cultures, exchanging energies, and travelling internationally
“Beyond the need to be collaborative, we’re a social group by nature; we enjoy each other’s company in and out of the office,” says Litster. “And we’re also very community-minded. One thing we immediately keyed in on with Apex was to contribute to the community in which we live and work. We support our local community by engaging in different activities throughout the year, and we’ve supported Action Mental Health, Macmillan Cancer Support, and Action for Children. We want our community to be strong for every generation ahead.”
With nearby Queen's University Belfast and Ulster University offering renowned degrees in finance, computer science, and software engineering, Apex has tapped into these universities to access the latest expertise in next-generation development. Investing in Northern Ireland and the universities is crucial to enable people from all walks of life to invest in their futures and continue to build up Belfast's tech workforce.
We look for talented engineers with a passion for making an impact and who want to work with world-class technology,” Litster explains. “We work with large, distributed, high-performance systems developing in Java, Python, Go, JavaScript/HTML, and React. Our database systems include MS SQLServer, Postgres, Redis, and MongoDB. We’re also in the cloud across AWS and GCP, and we tackle tuning and scaling the applications you build using Docker and Kubernetes.”
What’s ahead
At its core, Apex Fintech Solutions UK is a platform company. They work with companies changing the investing, advisory, and institutional worlds. They have a bright future in Belfast because so many talents are willing to collaborate and bring the best out of each other.
Their commitment to Belfast and with Invest NI means they’ll continue to grow their footprint. Stevenson says they will keep hiring and growing in both tech and operations. And it’s crucial, she says, “that we retain our high standards, productivity, and remain an attractive place to work in the market.”
