A brief history of the Footprint
In 2005 and 2006, Linn Software was engaged in pioneering software development to monitor the flow of trading orders at specific prices in order to chart a profile of how much trading was occurring at each price at the bid versus asking price as each trade occurred. This work culminated in a new release of Investor/RT early in 2006 featuring a new charting type that Linn Software named the Volume Profile chart. This style of market order flow histogram was also available at that time from a newly formed Chicago-area company, MarketDelta LLC, that named this charting style the Footprint Chart. The Linn Software Volume Profile implementation was more efficient, robust software with advanced market profiling and an extensive library of technical indicators additionally available to its clients. The Volume Profile was built on a mature software foundation; Investor/RT had been introduced ten years earlier and supported more sources of market data as well.
Linn Software began discussions with MarketDelta in the spring of 2006 and shortly thereafter, entered into a software licensing and distribution agreement whereby MarketDelta began distributing the Investor/RT software, branded as MarketDelta Charts. At that time Investor/RT Volume Profile charting was rebranded as Footprint charting, a registered trademark of MarketDelta LLC. Linn Software granted MarketDelta the exclusive right to distribute the Linn Software developed volume profile charting style under the trademarked Footprint branding. The Investor/RT charting platform continued to be enhanced and marketed by Linn Software with ongoing innovation and enhancements. All of the subsequent innovation of the Investor/RT platform was introduced into the MarketDelta Charts platform. All subsequent innovation and enhancement of Footprint charting flowed exclusively to MarketDelta Charts. Linn Software considered MarketDelta Charts to be the premium edition of Investor/RT with Footprint Charting.
Both companies prospered under this agreement for a decade, each with its independent client base, with Linn Software’s software engineering expertise and with MarketDelta bringing marketing and trader educational expertise to MarketDelta Chart clients. Both companies entered into agreements with the Chicago Board of Trade (now CME), to license the Market Profile trademark for branding the advanced market profile charting features developed by Linn Software. Both Market Profile and Footprint charting were later integrated into the core charting architecture of Investor/RT so that market profiles and footprints could be displayed in traditional charts of any periodicity along with other indicators, including user written custom indicator formulas.
The licensing agreement with MarketDelta, LLC ended in 2016 when MarketDelta ceased marketing and distribution of the MarketDelta Charts platform. Per the agreement, Linn Software retained copyright of all of its software and resumed offering footprint charting to its clients. In 2017, Linn Software launched enhanced Investor/RT Footprint charting under the trademark VolumeScope. MarketDelta later ceased operations and Linn Software acquired its trademarks and other assets. Investor/RT, VolumeScope, MarketDelta, MarketDelta Charts, and Footprint are now registered trademarks of Linn Software, Inc.