Thomson Reuters about to launch slew of new products

Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson of The Financial Times reports Tuesday that Thomson Reuters will begin a series of product launches starting next week and culminating in the autumn will bring together products from the former Reuters and Thomson Financial for the first time.

Edgecliffe-Johnson writes, “The web-based platforms, which replace traditional terminal commands with online search, were part of a drive to cater to ‘the 23-year-old at Goldman Sachs who grew up with Google,’ said Devin Wenig, chief executive of Thomson Reuters Markets.

“They are also aimed at distinguishing Thomson Reuters from Bloomberg, its arch-rival, which invested heavily through the financial crisis but has remained committed to its one-size-fits-all terminals.

“Thomson Reuters had to ‘radically slim the company down,’ Mr Wenig said. This would not be by cutting jobs – it plans to increase headcount ‘quite a lot’ this year – but by reorganising its sales and support staff so that ‘everybody in the company is going to be working on one of these two platforms.’

“Since the financial crisis began, big banks had consolidated, mid-sized customers struggled, but a ‘long tail’ of smaller customers had grown, Mr Wenig said. To cater for smaller clients cost-effectively, online training and customer support would be introduced.”

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