Just wondered if anyone has experience with a company called SuperDerivatives? They are hiring at the moment for 'independent portfolio revaluation'. Might this be a good opportunity for a first job in finance for an aspiring quant? I have formed some of my own opinions, but I'd be interested in hearing about what other people here think.

I had a friend working there, and it seemed like a good starting point. It could involve a lot of programming in C# and VBA and cover on improving valuation of derivatives, exotic derivatives pricing, market data management. I believe they are the top of the Gherkin

As s/w firms in this space go they are respected as much as any.IPF is a bit of a growth aware, as evidenced by the fact that they are hiring.I'm glad you're asking "what do I do after this job ?", this is critical to early career choices.Since SD is reasonably mass market there will be a bunch of firms who will value the skills of someone who knows some of their products at a deep level.However of course, many customers buy SD because they just want to have something that works and so this is a bit of a niche skill.SD are a s/w firm, most of the work is thus as punkfanatic says, coding, testing, etc and of course better skills in code make you a better quant.Coding is necessary but not sufficient, so the default path would be as some sort of quant/developer.The variable is whether this leads to a quant position and that is a function of several factors.1: What, exactly will you be doing at SD ? Some of the work will be modelling, some will be understanding the fine details of this area, etc.2: What is your background ?No job in a systems house will get you to be a quant if you haven't got the maths.3: The last and hardest to determine is the demand for IPF in 2-3 years time. If it is high, then the suck will pull in people and the chances of getting a job will go up.

Thanks both for your replies.punkfanatic - sounds about right.Dominic -Quote1: What, exactly will you be doing at SD ? Some of the work will be modelling, some will be understanding the fine details of this area, etc.Working on (i.e. coding) derivatives pricing products that they sell to clients (banks/funds), and handling requests from clients etc. Unsure of further details. I think I'd be expected to handle/code many asset classes, hence why I thought this might be an interesting - though perhaps unglamorous - first job in finance.Quote2: What is your background ?No job in a systems house will get you to be a quant if you haven't got the maths.PhD Physics, currently a post-doc. I'm aiming for jobs at 'quant funds' at the moment as my first choice. But I'm only willing/able to invest X of my time and energy in getting that, and the probability is low since every man and their dog is going for these roles, it is a function of X but also of many known and unknown variables I have no control of. So thinking of financial s/w companies as a possible plan B. Though might just go for something totally different. I could probably phone people up and try to sell them s/w stuff, but that's not ideally what I'd be doing in 3-5 years time.Quote3: The last and hardest to determine is the demand for IPF in 2-3 years time. If it is high, then the suck will pull in people and the chances of getting a job will go up.Seems like there is still a downward trend in exotic derivatives and complicated things in general, but an upward force from regulatory pressures, though I might just be making this up?

I worked @ SuperDerivatives as Revaluation Specialist, and my role (although i do have quantitative/programming skills) did not require these skills. my role included facing technical, economical questions by clients (HFAs, fund managers, Risk teams and M/O clients). might not be the exact position but that's my 2c