Case Study | FNZ

“To put BIG-IP Application Security Manager in front of the

site and have it mitigate our risk makes my life a lot easier.”
Neil Manning, Head of IT Security and Infrastructure, FNZ

Financial Services Provider FNZ Invests Overview

in Future Prosperity with a Solid Industry
Financial Services
Network Foundation from F5
Challenges
·· Deliver excellent online user
Founded just four years ago, FNZ of Wellington, New Zealand, operates performance
the financial services industry’s most complete third-party, online account ·· Provide 24/7 uptime for
management service. Called a “wrap” platform, FNZ’s technology enables online clients
investors and brokers to manage an entire portfolio through a single portal. ·· Eliminate security
vulnerabilities
Banks, securities firms, and insurers—including heavyweights such as Bank of ·· Establish a highly scalable
New Zealand and the UK’s Standard Life plc—use customized versions of FNZ’s infrastructure to support
infrastructure in place of building their own. According to FNZ CEO Adrian growth

Durham, FNZ is the only company that provides all of the necessary software and
Solution
hosting and handles back-end trading and settlement as well.
·· BIG-IP Global Traffic Manager
Today some 110,000 investors in the United Kingdom and New Zealand count on ·· BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager
FNZ-powered websites for help in planning their financial future. Serving so many ·· BIG-IP Link Controller
people might have been impossible had FNZ not done some advance planning ·· BIG-IP Application
of its own. Thanks in part to F5® BIG-IP® products and other F5 solutions, the Security Manager

company equipped itself from the outset to supply an expanding customer base ·· FirePass SSL VPN

with fast, reliable, and secure access to financial data. ·· WANJet

Benefits
Business Challenges
·· High performance
FNZ’s wrap platform originated as a custom First NZ Capital turned its wrap division and availability
solution developed by the Wellington-based into a wrap services outsourcer, which it ·· Simplified and seamless
investment bank and brokerage house, First eventually spun off as FNZ. Job one for the management
NZ Capital Ltd., for its own use. Launched six new business was bolstering its infrastructure ·· Security risks mitigated
years ago, the system was an instant hit, and to support hundreds of banking, securities,
·· Infrastructure prepared
before long company executives realized and insurance companies. FNZ knew that to support ambitious
that it might be equally popular with other such organizations would insist on robust worldwide expansion
financial institutions looking to introduce performance, as few investors have
wrap offerings of their own. patience for a sluggish website.
CASE
CASESTUDY
STUDY
FNZ
Name

“It has to be fast or they won’t use it,” says Benefits potential hackers before they can damage
Damian Millin, FNZ’s Chief Operating Officer. the company’s sites.
Together, all of those F5 products have
Moreover, consumers demand 24/7 access to
dramatically simplified the challenging task Companywide Standard
their accounts, so maintaining continuous
of maintaining high reliability during rapid FNZ’s experiences with BIG-IP products
uptime would also be critical. “If the system
expansion on multiple continents. “It’s a have inspired them to deploy additional F5
is down for any period, we’re in trouble,”
seamless solution that we don’t have to solutions. The company now uses WANJet,
Millin observes.
play around with,” says Manning. F5’s wide-area network optimization
Solution appliance, to accelerate traffic flows—and
One-Step Risk Mitigation
encrypt them as well. “Lots of our traffic is
Millin tasked Neil Manning, FNZ’s Head of IT Of course, in the financial services industry,
confidential. [WANJet] gives us that extra
Security and Infrastructure, with preparing security is every bit as big a concern as
level of security,” Manning says.
the company’s wrap systems for wider availability. “It is absolutely critical,” says
commercial usage. Manning quickly turned Durham. “If we had a single case where FNZ also uses F5’s FirePass SSL VPN appliance
to F5’s BIG-IP products for help. “It became anyone’s personal information became to help employees working offsite securely
obvious early on that we would need better accessible to somebody who shouldn’t see it, connect with network resources back at
load balancing,” he recalls. Plus, he used to I believe we’d basically be out of business.” headquarters.
work for one of F5’s top New Zealand resellers,
Not surprisingly, then, when a routine Today, in fact, F5 solutions are FNZ’s
so he was familiar with the impact F5 products
security audit early in FNZ’s history revealed companywide standard for Application
can have on performance and reliability.
a number of vulnerabilities common to Delivery Networking. “Out of all the
Today, Manning uses BIG-IP products in financial websites, Manning acted quickly. vendors I deal with, F5 [is] probably the most
a variety of roles. BIG-IP® Local Traffic At the time, the company was in the midst of responsive,” Manning says. “The sales team
Manager™ (LTM) Application Delivery a furious growth spurt. in New Zealand has always been very
Controller helps him keep response times down proactive in helping us solve problems.”
“We were building websites at a phenomenal
by distributing traffic evenly across FNZ’s web
rate, two or three a month,” Manning says. Matthew Moore, an F5 senior pre-sales
servers. The BIG-IP® Global Traffic Manager™
Reassigning developers to security-related engineer who supports FNZ, hails the
(GTM) device helps him maintain nonstop
chores would put the brakes on that work. company for being equally proactive.
uptime by enabling seamless failover among
“Right from the start, they have always
FNZ’s four data centers in New Zealand and Instead, Manning installed BIG-IP Application
taken the long view when making
Scotland. Security Manager, a web application firewall
architectural decisions. They used a lot
that keeps all but anticipated and authorized
The BIG-IP® Link Controller™ product module of foresight and really built a foundation
Internet transactions outside a company’s
prevents slow or severed ISP connections from that enabled them to grow,” Moore says.
defensive perimeter.
inconveniencing customers. “If an ISP wants
Good thing, too, because FNZ has ambitious
to do some major work on their network, The payoff was immediate. Thanks to
plans for continued expansion in Europe,
we just shut them down and all of the traffic BIG-IP ASM, none of the previously detected
Canada, and Asia. “Our aim is to get this
flows on the other ISPs,” Manning says. weaknesses showed up in FNZ’s next audit.
product out to as many people as we can as
“We know there are some vulnerabilities in
As further needs arose, FNZ also implemented fast as we can,” says Millin. That means FNZ’s
the website, but to fix the code is a huge
the BIG-IP® Application Security Manager™ core applications can expect rising workloads
cost,” Manning observes. “To put BIG-IP ASM
(ASM) product module as well as the FirePass® for years to come.
in front of the site and have it mitigate our
SSL VPN and WANJet® appliances to round
risk makes my life a lot easier.” “Every 12 months we’ll need to double
out a complete, forward-looking Application
the number of transactions [we process],”
Delivery Networking system. BIG-IP ASM detailed transaction logs also
Millin predicts. Thanks to the BIG-IP system
expose threats that would be difficult to see
and other F5 solutions, he continues, FNZ’s
otherwise, helping FNZ identify and block
infrastructure is up to the challenge.

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Local Traffic Manager, and WANJet are trademarks or registered trademarks of F5 Networks, Inc. in the U.S. and in certain other countries. CS25764 0110