Finance Labs
Roger Williams Finance Lab - Video Wall installation
Posted on Mon, November 9, 2009
Roger Williams has been a Rise client for many years originating with our 3 color LED wallboards through an upgrade 3 years ago to a LCD Video Wall. Video Walls come in all shapes and sizes and for their finance lab we utilized NEC monitors to create a 3x1 wall that acts as the focal point to the room showing all of the latest market information from around the world.
This picture was taken last week during a service visit and as you can see after over 3 years the displays still look very sharp. While the displays may not have the ultra thin bezels and sleek look of the video walls we are installing today, the effect is still the same when people view the room for the first time - the displays definitely attract attention.
Custom LED Ticker Installation at Arkansas Tech University
Posted on Wed, November 25, 2009
When students choose Arkansas Tech, they get the best of two worlds: big-time technology and education in a friendly, small-town setting. Because the university believes that exposing students to tomorrow’s technology is the only way to prepare them for the jobs they deserve, Tech has invested in world-class equipment and facilities.
To bring the latest in technology to the new trading lab opening next semester in the college of business the faculty enlisted the help of Rise Display to design a unique LED Ticker that starts in the hallway, goes through the glass wall, and wraps around the finance lab.
The focal point of the trading room is a large 2x2 LCD Video Wall showing the latest market updates and news information controlled by Display Wire.
Learning is a serious business, my hat goes off to Arkansas Tech for investing in the technology to create this one of a kind atmosphere for their students.
Curved LED Ticker at Ramapo College
Posted on Tue, December 1, 2009
At the April 2008 dedication ceremony for the new college of business building, Richard and Millicent Anisfield announced an additional gift of $3 million to the school that bears their name. This latest gift was used to fund the completion of the fifth floor of the new building, adding a number of new classrooms, faculty offices, and an exciting, new Global Financial Markets Trading Laboratory. With real-time access to financial data from around the world, students will expand their knowledge of the workings of global markets by managing virtual portfolios of stocks, bond, commodities and currencies.
As part of the Trading Lab Rise Display was proud to provide a unique 8 color LED ticker that wraps 2 walls and follows the curved design at the front of the classroom along with several LCD digital displays to help create the trading atmosphere.
Digital Signage in Education: Johnson & Wales Finance Lab
Posted on Wed, December 9, 2009
The Johnson and Wales University Providence campus was Founded in 1914, JWU’s first and largest campus hosts more than 10,000 students from all 50 states and more than 60 countries in the fast-paced urban center of historic Providence, RI.
Rise is proud to have taken part in the addition of a finance lab within the college of business to provide a focal point to their program. The system includes multiple LCD screens both inside the classroom and in the hallways to create awareness for the financial markets along with a long, custom full color LED Ticker display to create a unique atmosphere.
The display technology combined with industry-trained faculty, working in small classroom settings, brings a blend of traditional business education and real world experience.
Digital Signage Technology Tip: Video Wall verses LED Wallboard
Posted on Tue, December 15, 2009
Historically Financial Trading Floors and Business School Finance Labs have used large LED wallboards to post current market data and news. The LED wallboards provide long life, great viewing distances and you could easily build large walls out of them to create a focal point in any trading environment.
A couple of good photo examples can be seen at: PIMCO and University of Pittsburgh.
With advancements in LCD technology and the new ultra thin bezels, video walls have replaced these LED datawalls. For users still investigating the LED wallboard technology here are 5 things to investigate and compare to help make your decision:
Color - with a LED wallboard you get 3 colors (red, green, amber) verses with a video wall you get the full spectrum of color
Flexibility- with a LED wallboard it is alpha numeric meaning a fixed character height for letters and numbers and if you purchase a 16 line by 64 character display, that will always be your limit. The advantage of what you can dynamically do with a video wall is obvious.
Graphics - with a LED wallboard you are limited to alpha numeric characters, with the video wall you can show graphs, charts, animations, video and live TV
Lead time - LED wallboards are custom built to order normally taking 6 weeks or better to build. LCDs are in stock and can ship the same week.
Price - with all of that functionality you would expect the LCD video wall to be more expensive. Actually it is on average 20% to 25% more economical.
Overall LED wallboards are still a great technology, but they just can’t compete with the mass production of LCD screens and in the end price and flexibility will always win. If you want more information you can view a 10 minute video comparison of the technologies.
Digital Signage in Education: Acuff Financial Markets Center
Posted on Wed, December 16, 2009
On October 2, 2009 the Mason School of Business at William and Mary University officially dedicated the new Alan B. Miller Hall.
The new facility boasts: 166,000 square feet of space, over 500,000 bricks, 1,260 tons of steel, 350 windows and a state-of-the-art electronic trading classroom. If you would like to learn more about this exciting project I would encourage you to visit their website to see more facts, watch video reactions of students first impressions, and some of the videos from Rex’s unplugged diary as he brought the building out of the ground and into reality.
The Acuff Financial Markets Center is one of the highlights on the tour utilizing the latest in digital signage technology including three 57” LCDs, and two 2x2 LCD video walls all showing the latest market information, graphs, news, and video from around the world. In addition to the trading lab the school has strategically placed over 20 LCD screens throughout the building to keep students informed of the latest events along with live market data to create a high energy business environment.
Digital Signage from Rise Display Creates ‘Dynamic Ambiance’ at University of Oklahoma
Posted on Wed, January 6, 2010
The University of Oklahoma is known both for sports teams that consistently win national championships, and for its students’ high academic achievements. Indeed, the university’s Price College of Business ranks in U.S. News & World Report’s top 50 in undergraduate business schools and in the top 15 in undergraduate business specialties for international business. One way that OU maintains its standards of excellence is to offer the latest technology to its students—most recently, digital signage from Rise Display.
“We were searching around for the best vendor to help us get this [digital signage] up, and that’s where Rise came in,” says Robert Dauffenbach, Associate Dean of Research and Graduate Programs.
The digital signage was to be installed in a new, approximately 1,500 square-foot trading room at the business school. The room seats 32 computer stations, where students study, research, and put presentations together, and Dauffenbach dedicated significant time and energy to determining the best and most appropriate vendor for the project. As part of his research, he learned which other business schools around the country were using digital displays, and even went to visit several campuses in person. The vendor these schools kept referencing was Rise Display.
The digital signage installation began during the summer of 2009 and ended just in time for the university’s fall semester to begin. Now the trading room boasts an impressive 36-foot long, eight-color LED Ticker, 2x2 video wall using ultra thin bezels, and two single 46-inch displays. Rise Display Systems remotely handles the content, including financial data streaming, for the monitors. On any given day, students will see stock information on Oklahoma public companies, as well as data on worldwide markets, displayed on the digital signage.
“The scrolling LED ticker display increases the dynamic ambiance of the room,” Dauffenbach says, “Rise was the only [vendor] I found that was able to get that for us.”
Because of the room’s new, professional atmosphere, it is perfect for certain Price College events. Recently, a breakfast meeting was held there for the Price College Board of Advisers, with a special guest in attendance: Jim Kramer, host of CNBC’s “Mad Money.” “We had the ticker display going and, of course, all the statistics from various markets around the world displayed,” says Dauffenbach. “It was a nice backdrop for the get-together with Kramer.”
Utilizing a Real-World Application to Engage Students in Finance Labs
Posted on Tue, February 9, 2010
Finance trading rooms are often the showpiece for the finance and economics programs of today’s business schools. The lab serves as a central location for students to learn about the markets, and gain hands-on experience with technology. Once the construction of the lab is complete, faculty members are faced with the dilemma of how to structure the curriculum and what software should they utilize.
One data provider that is working closely with universities is Telemet Orion. Telemet provides their real-world application complete with financial market data, investment analysis and portfolio management tools to educational facilities at a discounted rate.
Several leading business schools (click on link to see a photo of their trading room)such as: Seton Hall, Miami of Ohio, High Point University, Indiana State University, North Carolina A&T and Winthrop University all use the Telemet real-time data platform to educate their students.
Some schools such as Virginia Tech and Georgia State University use the same tools to manage real money in their the student-managed investment funds. Does it work? According to Genna Brown, faculty advisor for the student managed equity fund at Georgia State University “Our student portfolio managers are beating their benchmark and doing professional analysis now that we have a sophisticated database at their disposal.”
If your trading lab is looking for real-world trading tools I would encourage you to learn more about the Telemet Orion Education Package.
Creating a Financial Boardroom Setting
Posted on Wed, February 10, 2010
Do you need to create an financial atmosphere in your boardroom? Whether you are a business school creating an environment for visiting businesses or a financial firm enhancing a boardroom to impress clients, the addition of a LCD TV and a LED Ticker can create an impressive environment.
The enclosed picture shows one of the executive meeting rooms at Marywood University in PA. In addition to utilizing displays for their trading lab, they also choose to implement signage in this conference room to provide a business setting for meetings with guests.
College of William and Mary Turns to Rise Display for Trading Room’s Wall Street Simulation
Posted on Wed, February 17, 2010
John Merrick, Richard S. Reynolds associate professor of business at the College of William and Mary’s Mason School of Business, has had a diverse career in both academics and Wall Street. That was why, when he first came to the university in 2005, he was asked to provide a vision for how the school’s proposed Acuff Financial Markets Center could be developed.
“I had had some experience teaching in a trading room,” says Professor Merrick, “and wanted a room that would serve as a financial market lab and, at the same time, and really foremost, as a superior, technology-enhanced lecture space. I think that’s the difference in our room versus other layouts that I’ve seen: It is first and foremost a superior lecture space.”
The Acuff Financial Markets Center now holds both undergraduate and MBA finance classes. In addition, the Center houses the school’s student-run Batten Investment Fund. To simulate a live markets environment, the room incorporates nine Bloomberg terminals—the leading professional system to monitor and analyze financial market data—among its thirty-six student workstations, as well as eleven state-of-the-art LCDs, provided by Rise Display.
“I knew that Rise Display was the premium provider of these displays because I saw how things had worked out at Baruch College, where I formerly taught,” Professor Merrick explains. “I had also caught up with Rise at an academic conference . . . so I introduced them to our building team . . . to see if they concurred.”
They did, and the results of the installation, says Professor Merrick, have been phenomenal.
“In terms of teaching in that room, what you end up with is a very exciting environment,” he says. “You’re getting [students] to work in an environment of routine visual distraction . . . where they have to learn how to absorb what’s coming in and only be attracted by the important stuff, rather than distracted by the changing displays. The second part of the benefits,” Professor Merrick adds, “is being able to put data into our playlist that’s relevant for the topics we’re teaching that day.”
Among the information presented on the nine LCDs lining one side wall, and the two LCDs flanking the front of the room, are CNBC feeds, a news ticker, stock prices, money market rates, bond yields, foreign exchange rates, commodity prices and historical stock and bond market graphs.
“Everybody loves the digital displays,” says Professor Merrick. “Not only our students, but our alumni who come back, especially those who are connected to Wall Street, are duly impressed. Some of our more recent alumni are a little bit jealous,” he adds with a laugh. “They wish they had had these facilities when they were here.”
Displays Contribute to Experiential Learning Experience at University of Toronto Mississauga
Posted on Thu, February 25, 2010
Tucked into the library at the University of Toronto Mississauga is the Li Koon Chun Finance Learning Centre. A new, state-of-the-art facility, the Centre offers 32 computer stations and four Bloomberg terminals for student use and training purposes. In addition, the Centre is used as a unique classroom for students in the department of management at University of Toronto Mississauga.
“There are a couple of finance courses and an international business course held in the Centre,” explains Michael Meth, the Centre’s director. “The management program is one of our biggest supporters, but because of our location in the library, we reach a lot of people on our campus.”
Because of this reach, it was important to the University that the Centre offered cutting-edge communication solutions. Enter Rise Display. “The service level, the pricing, and the fact that our needs were met were the factors in choosing Rise,” says Mr. Meth. “We were told that we were Canada’s first eight-color stock ticker. That was a neat thing that Rise got to innovate with us.” In addition to the stock ticker, the Finance Learning Centre is equipped with three LCDs. All three are located near the entrance to the centre: two on one wall, and the other on the opposing wall. The ticker also runs on a wall near the entrance, and a wall of windows lets library patrons see the technology at all angles.
“The digital signage lets us push through market news, North American Exchange stock quotes and index data, and a live video feed from the Business News Network,” Mr. Meth says
Mr. Meth has also found an effective way of utilizing the ticker at night, when the stock market is closed but the library is still open. “We keep the closing prices running, but we also start running sports scores,” he says. In addition, the Centre uses the ticker to scroll customized welcome messages for special guests of the university.
“I think people are pretty impressed by the digital signage,” says Mr. Meth. “People will often stand by the window and watch what’s going on the ticker and displays. Overall, they’ve been very favorably received.”
The University of Texas at Austin Sees ROI in Ticker Web Service
Posted on Mon, March 1, 2010
Derek Fisher, assistant director of the EDS Financial Trading and Technology Center at The University of Texas at Austin McCombs School of Business, knows all about innovation.
“The Trading Center was the first of its kind in the country,” Mr. Fisher says. “It has been a model for other institutions. We do tours all the time for other schools that have since implemented similar programs.”
The Center is divided between a fund room and classroom/lab. The fund room is used exclusively by the 17 to 20 MBA students who are accepted each year as fund managers. On a daily basis, these students manage a $14 million privately held fund, seeded with investments from UT alumni and others.
Meanwhile, the classroom/lab seats approximately 40 people and is a fully equipped media room. The space features all high-definition displays, video conferencing for distance learning, 40 computer stations equipped with a variety of finance applications, and four Bloomberg stations. The room offers a state-of-the-art space for mostly undergraduate financial classes. When class is not in session, the room operates as a lab for finance students, who use the computers and different data feeds for their research assignments.
Naturally, the Center also utilizes digital signage: A ticker is strategically placed outside the fund room, where it serves as a focal point in the business school, and an LED tracker is used in the classroom/lab.
In January 2010, University of Texas staff approached Rise Display about upgrading their software packages for both the ticker and LED tracker. “It came down to an expense issue,” says Mr. Fisher. “We found out about Rise, who offered both the data and the software at a much more economical price.” According to Fisher, the software also had additional functionality that made it very enticing for UT to make the change.
Chief among that functionality is the ability to incorporate news headlines into the ticker, the ability to display corporate logos on the ticker, and include rotating information on the LED tracker. “I can display one set of information on the board for 20 to 30 seconds and then it will rotate and display another set of financial information for another 20 to 30 seconds,” explains Fisher. “I think the display draws people’s attention because it’s not just static information. It’s always changing. A lot of our professors really like teaching in there because . . . they will refer to the information up on the board. With our previous software, I was limited to what I could fit on the screen at one time.”
Of the software’s usability, Fisher says, “The software has certainly been easy for me to maintain. It pretty much runs itself.” He adds, “I’ve been very pleased so far with Rise’s customer service. They’ve been very responsive. They’ve also been proactive in contacting me to make sure we’re satisfied and that things are operating smoothly. It’s been a very positive experience.”
