• Jo Howes, Commercial Director at Crealogix


• 28.01.2019 11:30 am
undisclosed

Monzo’s new collaboration with Flux is a great example of proactively using open banking to give customers new value from their banking applications. This approach to integrations with third party fintechs shows that open banking is working to increase innovation and competition, to the benefit of consumers.

Younger generations of bank account holders are adopting challengers such as Monzo, Tandem, and Starling Bank in droves, as these smartphone-focused accounts provide more convenience and personalised features. If traditional banks fail to accelerate their digital transformation, they risk losing out on market share to challengers that provide more of the modern features that attract Gen-Zs and Millennials.

Established banks should have the upper hand in this scenario, as they already have the foundations of trust and market share to keep them ahead of the game. The mobile banking innovations of the challengers are technologically within their grasp to imitate: the key point about integrations we are starting to see from challengers is that it requires a strategic openness as well as the technical implementation of open banking. For high street banks, a historical failure to innovate – including a passive attitude towards open banking – has meant that there is a strategy shift as well as a technology gap to address, when it comes to competing with the rising crowd of banking challengers.