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TransAlta

04/08/2020 / Case Study


CLIENT

TransAlta

SECTOR

Commercial

YEAR

2020

TransAlta owns, operates and develops a diverse fleet of electrical power generation assets in Canada, the United States, and Australia with a focus on long-term shareholder value. The company provides municipalities, medium and large industries, businesses, and utility customers with clean, affordable, energy efficient and reliable power.

TransAlta is one of Canada’s largest producers of wind power and Alberta’s largest producer of hydroelectric power.

Key Results

Overcame operational challenges to keep trading smoothly


Met critical deadlines without any disruption to business


Gained reliable connections to physical and derivative markets


Benefited from complete transparency in work and control over the trading data


Uncovered and implemented additional operational efficiencies within weeks


Freed technical staff to focus on driving business, not putting out operational fires

 

The Challenge

Like many large and dynamic firms, TransAlta’s trading business in commodities is undergoing rapid change. As a large organization, they had made many custom changes to their trading systems that slowed their ability to meet internal project goals. Yet, as their business strategy evolved to increase trading in financial derivatives markets, so did their needs.

TransAlta hit a roadblock when ICE announced breaking changes to the ICE Trade Capture API. TransAlta learned that they would have to make technical changes on a short timeframe to maintain trade data automation in this key derivatives market. To make the required technical changes, TransAlta would be forced to redo many of their customizations. With the deadline to complete these technical changes just weeks away, this was simply too disruptive and risky

 

The Solution

TransAlta was already successfully relying on BroadPeak’s K3 solution for other exchange data feeds related to compliance. They sought to additionally leverage K3 to automatically retrieve all necessary derivatives trade data and prevent disruption to their business.

For day-to-day operational support, TransAlta selected Value Creed for unmatched expertise in outsourced trading platform management. Since Value Creed already had a strong relationship with BroadPeak, working together was seamless.

Value Creed led the implementation of K3 to replace the existing vendor’s trade feeds within a month. During the process, the collaborative team uncovered additional operational improvements to implement for increased efficiencies.

Organizational factors from TransAlta were also key to a successful delivery: A well-organized IT group who can execute under time constraints, executive sponsorship, and technical folks with the ability to solve unexpected issues and reduce friction throughout the effort.

 

The Result

TransAlta met the key ICE Trade Capture API deadline without making risky changes or otherwise disrupting business. And with Value Creed managing their software platform, they are no longer battling day-to-day operational issues.

 

We had an incredibly short period to make these changes so we could maintain automation of our trade data feeds. Interrupting business operations was not an option. Luckily, BroadPeak and Value Creed met our deadline. Their commitment to our project was impressive.

Chris Koch, Risk Systems Specialist, TransAlta

 

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