Symphony is an instant messaging service designed for use by financial firms. The software features include workplace chat, voice calling, video conferencing,

encryption In Cryptography law, cryptography, encryption (more specifically, Code, encoding) is the process of transforming information in a way that, ideally, only authorized parties can decode. This process converts the original representation of the inf ...

, and support for third-party plugins. Symphony is developed by Symphony Communication Services.

History

The technology was initially developed by

Goldman Sachs The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered in Lower Manhattan in New York City, with regional headquarters in many internationa ...

as an internal messaging system called Live Current. In October 2014, Goldman Sachs and 14 other financial institutions invested $66 million to establish Symphony Communication Services LLC and acquire Perzo, Inc., a secure communication application known for its

end-to-end encryption End-to-end encryption (E2EE) is a method of implementing a secure communication system where only communicating users can participate. No one else, including the system provider, telecom providers, Internet providers or malicious actors, can ...

messaging. Perzo was founded by David Gurle in 2012, and he served as Symphony's CEO from 2014 to 2021. Gurle played a role in developing communication solutions for

Skype Skype () was a proprietary telecommunications application operated by Skype Technologies, a division of Microsoft, best known for IP-based videotelephony, videoconferencing and voice calls. It also had instant messaging, file transfer, ...

Thomson Reuters Thomson Reuters Corporation ( ) is a Canadian multinational corporation, multinational content-driven technology Conglomerate (company), conglomerate. The company was founded in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and maintains its headquarters at 1 ...

, and

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

. Symphony 2.0 was announced during the company's annual Innovate Conference in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

in October 2019. The release of software components called Elements aimed to facilitate the development of custom applications on the Symphony platform. Symphony 2.0 was launched one year later. By 2020, Symphony claimed to have amassed over 400,000 users on its platform. Brad Levy joined Symphony in July 2020 as the president and chief commercial officer. In June 2021, he assumed the role of chief executive officer after former founder David Gurle stepped down from the executive position. Levy had previous experience working at Goldman Sachs and IHS Markit before joining Symphony.

Funding

In September 2014, fifteen financial firms, including

Bank of America The Bank of America Corporation (Bank of America) (often abbreviated BofA or BoA) is an American multinational investment banking, investment bank and financial services holding company headquartered at the Bank of America Corporate Center in ...

and

BNY Mellon The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation, commonly known as BNY, is an American international financial services company headquartered in New York City. It was established in its current form in July 2007 by the merger of the Bank of New York an ...

, made investments in Symphony. In October 2015, Symphony announced a successful funding round of $100 million, led by

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

. Lakestar,

Natixis BPCE (for Banque Populaire Caisse d'Epargne) is a major French banking group formed by the 2009 merger of two major retail banking groups, Groupe Caisse d'Épargne and Groupe Banque Populaire. As of 2021, it was France's fourth-largest bank, t ...

, and other firms also participated in the investment. In May 2017, Symphony secured an additional $63 million in funding from

BNP Paribas BNP Paribas (; sometimes referred to as BNPP or BNP) is a French multinational universal bank and financial services holding company headquartered in Paris. It was founded in 2000 from the merger of two of France's foremost financial instituti ...

and existing investors, resulting in a total valuation of the company surpassing $1 billion. In June 2019, Symphony announced a funding round of $165 million with a valuation of $1.4 billion.

Standard Chartered Standard Chartered PLC is a British multinational bank with operations in wealth management, corporate and investment banking, and treasury services. Despite being headquartered in the United Kingdom, it does not conduct retail banking in th ...

, MUFG Innovation Partners, and other undisclosed current and new investors contributed to the funding. Since September 2014, Symphony has raised a total of $460 million. The company's most recent funding round took place in December 2020, known as the Series E round, where it raised $50 million from existing investors.

Acquisitions

On November 28, 2014, Symphony Communication Services LLC completed the acquisition of technology assets from Collaboration Services, the open messaging network developed by Markit Ltd. The financial details of the transaction were not disclosed. On June 24, 2021, Symphony Communication Services LLC acquired Cloud9 Technologies, a voice

trading turret A trading turret or dealer board is a specialized Key telephone system, telephony key system that is generally used by Trader (finance), financial traders on their trading desks. Trading has progressed from floor trading through phone trading to e ...

phone system used by financial traders. On August 2, 2021, Symphony Communication Services LLC acquired StreetLinx, a counterparty mapping platform. On November 29, 2021, Symphony Communication Services LLC acquired Amenity Analytics, a natural language processing (NLP) data analytics solution.

License

The Symphony Software Foundation has announced its decision to use the Apache License 2.0 for providing the software as open-source. The foundation will make the contributions available through its GitHub repository.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Symphony Communication Services Project management software Collaborative software Goldman Sachs Communication software