The Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) has announced the creation of a standalone technology division to be headed by a new, as-yet-unannounced, chief information officer (CIO).

Spun off from the ASX’s current Group Executive, Technology and Data and CIO function, the new standalone tech division will be tasked with boosting “system resilience” across the organisation, as well as the “delivery of multi-year technology transformation programs”.

The new CIO will report directly to ASX chief executive Helen Lofthouse.

Lofthouse said the leadership shift would create “a single point of senior executive focus and accountability for delivering the ASX’s enterprise-wide technology renewal program”.

The ASX added that the creation of the new division will help free up resources for current group executive, technology and data and CIO, Dan Chesterman, enabling him “to apply his full focus to leading the customer-facing technology and data business”.

The focus for Chesterman’s division now will be on maturing the ASX’s enterprise data capability and growing its technical and data products and services, the company said.

Chesterman, who was appointed to the role in mid-2021, maintains responsibility for the ASX’s core data functions – including data centre and connectivity business, market data and analytics products (including DataSphere), the ASX’s distributed ledger technology (DLT) platform and solutions business (DLT Solutions). Up till now, the role also included oversight of ASX’s core technology functions including infrastructure, architecture, engineering, testing and systems integration.

“This is ASX’s fastest-growing business, and Dan will continue to focus on important strategic initiatives such as expanding customer access to ASX’s rich data sets,” the ASX said in a statement.

Lofthouse said: “ASX operates multiple areas of critical market infrastructure for the region, and this additional role will provide further breadth and depth in this key area underpinning our business.

“It also provides additional scope and bandwidth for Dan Chesterman and the team to focus their efforts on data and technology innovation, and expanding enterprise data capability across data science and analytics, information services, data governance and the ASX data platform.”

The ASX confirmed that there are no changes to the delivery of its CHESS replacement program, which will continue to be led by Project Director Tim Whiteley, appointed to the role in November 2022.