Chris Isaacson on Resilient Market Infrastructure and Tech Leadership at Cboe

Technovation with Peter High (CIO, CTO, CDO, CXO Interviews)

“Resilience is a mindset.” Chris Isaacson, Chief Operating Officer of Cboe Global Markets, joins Technovation host Peter High to discuss how the global exchange operator delivers trusted, 24/7 markets through technology, operational excellence, and a deeply integrated data strategy. A founding employee of BATS Global Markets and former CIO of both BATS and Cboe, Chris reflects on his two-decade journey scaling from startup to enterprise. He shares insights on building fault-tolerant platforms, organizing global teams for growth, and navigating crises like the flash crash and COVID with calm, systems-level thinking. Chris also explores the future of exchange operations, from AI-powered security and timestamping services to data commercialization and agentic software development.

Key themes include:

• Building hyper-resilient, globally consistent trading infrastructure
• Lessons in leadership from startup growth to post-acquisition scale
• Cboe’s unified data platform and timestamping innovations
• The future of exchange technology with GenAI and software agents
• Cybersecurity as the #1 enterprise risk, and how to lead accordingly