• Nóra Bézi, Mobile DevOps Specialist at Bitrise


• 13.07.2020 05:45 pm
Fintech

The fintech revolution in the mobile space

Fintech mobile applications are rapidly becoming the norm when it comes to handling our personal finances. As these apps grow in popularity and continue to define our relationship with money, the number – and the quality – of competing apps will only increase. With the proliferation of sophisticated apps offering a range of low-barrier financial services on mobile, incumbent banks will soon have no choice but to rethink their mobile development practices, adopt new technologies, and consider paths that they hadn’t thought of before — if they want to remain competitive. 

User experience as a decision-making factor

One of the main reasons fintech apps are disrupting the status quo is their strong focus on innovative services, customer-first approach, and agile processes. It shows why a technology-forward mindset is crucial: customers have come to expect personalized, effortless, and intuitive digital experiences. According to Founder’s Digital bank adoption statistics, convenience was named by customers as the primary reason for opening a digital banking account for the second year in a row. Another research paper on Global FinTech Adoption by EY found that when choosing a finance and banking app, the pivotal decision-making factors for customers were attractive fees, ease of setting up an account, access to innovative products or services, and the quality of user experience.  

Arguably, one thing that plays an important role in making it easier for users to set up an account is user-friendly, straightforward — but at the same time, entertaining — UI design. As App Annie’s The State of Mobile in 2020 report states, “A good mobile experience can make trading stock or transferring money as fun as leveling up in a game or as engaging as social media.” This resonates well, especially with millennials who tend to find themselves more engaged through gamified experiences. Creating such an experience, however, requires effective cross-functional collaboration, resources, and most importantly, time. 

How to make mobile right in a heavily regulated sector

The strict requirements of finance and banking apps introduce new complexities to the already uniquely challenging mobile development. End-users of fintech and banking apps want cutting-edge, modern mobile experiences that comply with international security regulations, on both high and low-end devices. They increasingly expect advanced functionalities, such as real-time processing, access to multi-currency accounts, fast, secure transactions, and features that protect their personal data. In order to continuously improve a finance or mobile banking app, teams need to rapidly react to user feedback and release frequently.

By shifting the responsibility of hardware and security maintenance from a team to a platform, a mobile-specific CI/CD tool serves as a solid foundation for automating error-prone and time-consuming processes. It also facilitates other practices that are commonly performed in Mobile DevOps teams, such as rolling deployment, test automation, and continuous delivery. All of these practices can help release high-quality software, more frequently — making it easier to respond to customer feedback. 

The results of a streamlined development pipeline are shorter time to market, fewer app failures, less maintenance, more time to create innovative features, and consequently, higher app store ratings. The main point of automation, therefore, is not replacing humans with technology. Rather, it is saving resources to allow human talent to be used where it has the biggest impact: designing beautiful, innovative experiences for end-users.

Some of the world’s most security-conscious teams rely on Bitrise to build safely. To learn more about how it can help you with building great and secure mobile apps, visit https://www.bitrise.io/.