Cracking the Code: How Integrated Order and Execution Management Systems are Powering APAC Hedge Funds’ Next Leap

FlexTrade’s FlexONE has recently been awarded “Best OMS” at the HFM Asia Services Awards 2025. This recognition marks the latest achievement in a period of significant growth within the APAC region.  Mark Kuuse, Asia Sales at FlexTrade, discusses what is driving change in APAC hedge funds, and why an integrated OEMS is now a “must-have” for trading desks.

Why are firms now looking toward integrated Order and Execution Management Systems (OEMS) in the APAC region?

As firms in the APAC region have grown, so too has the complexity associated with their trading activities. At launch, trading technology setups have typically been built around an in-house or third-party OMS that integrates with either a single asset-class EMS or a combination of multiple asset-class-dedicated EMS platforms.

However, as managers look to diversify strategies, what was effective on Day 1 for a team of discretionary portfolio managers (PMs) is often not suitable when the fund looks to add, say, a systematic PM. This shift can quickly reveal the limitations of their existing setup. More concerning, it may expose them to regulatory breaches. For instance, introducing a systematic trading strategy requires trading technology and architecture designed for speed and scalability—factors that understandably, may not have been considered at inception, which can complicate key functions such as pre-trade compliance and risk checks moving forward.

Today, our discussions in the APAC market focus on firms seeking to transition away from fragmented trading technology architectures with disparate OMS and EMS components and instead look towards an integrated solution that provides the flexibility to change and adapt as their business requirements evolve, or new market opportunities arise. A flexible, scalable multi-asset, multi-strategy OEMS, like FlexONE, is now becoming a “must-have” in the market.

What sets FlexONE apart from other solutions available on the market?

First and foremost, FlexONE is a truly integrated OEMS solution that has been designed from inception to deliver multi-asset, multi-strategy capabilities that hedge funds need as standard. This includes high capacity and throughput, robust compliance, risk management, and portfolio management, as well as unique trading functionalities such as centralized order marking, automatic short locates, crossing, merging, and pairs/spread trading.

Typically, many of the competing solutions we see in the market have been bolted together either through internal development or following solution acquisition by a vendor. Speaking purely from a development and roadmap perspective, trying to bolt together an OMS and EMS in the hedge fund space is fraught with challenges. Time and resources are spent on maintaining integration rather than developing new functionality, and if architected incorrectly, inconsistencies ranging from security identifiers to broader data collection between solutions can become apparent.

We believe a key differentiator for FlexONE and FlexTrade as a whole is our dedicated domain function. It’s complemented by our commitment to collaboration and client-driven development—a key feature that drives all of our solutions. Non-proprietary functionality is available in the core product, meaning that advances we have made in our order marking engine, internalization, and crossing capabilities, as well as advanced allocation logic, are used and continually developed in tandem with our client base.

Additionally, FlexONE offers an API-first approach to trading technology.  Flexible, robust APIs built on gRPC provide the foundation for clients to build the unique trading engines they need within the FlexONE risk and trade management framework. It includes everything from e-locates to compliance, analytics, and alerts, as well as some of the previously mentioned functionality, such as internal crossing and order marking. A great example of how our open-API architecture is gaining traction in the APAC region is our clients’ use of our multi-asset pairs spread trader, which simplifies the workflow for executing linked securities trades, arranging short locates, and running compliance and allocations from within a single solution.

What’s new in FlexONE and what is coming down the pipe regarding future development?

We’re committed to delivering the most advanced, scalable OEMS solution available on the market. Over the past 12 months alone, we’ve started rolling out the FlexONE Data Warehouse solution to clients, which has been built from the ground up to enable users to snap positions, P&L, risk, quantities, and exposures, and present this information through a sophisticated visualization tool for analysis.

We also continue to enhance the FlexONE Mobile app with new features and workflows. Client adoption for the app has been very positive, providing a seamless on-the-move interface for traders, portfolio managers, operations teams, compliance, IT, and business functions within managers who may need to interact with the FlexONE OEMS.

From a multi-asset coverage perspective, we continually expand our asset and instrument coverage. For instance, we’ve recently revamped FX options to include exotics, continued rollout of our digital assets functionality, and on the horizon are sophisticated interest rates trading capabilities.

Interested to Learn More?

If you’d like to discuss how FlexONE can help you meet your complex trading requirements, please contact Mark Kuuse – Asia Sales, APAC, FlexTrade Systems – Mark.Kuuse@FlexTrade.com