Building Singapore's first cloud-native digital bank

• A new venture gains backing from prominent financial and retail entities to launch one of the first of the nation’s new wave of digital banks in Singapore 

• Zühlke is appointed as a strategic technology advisor to prime initiative for success, supporting in the end-to-end development and delivery of the new digital bank  

• The new app attracts over 500,000 users in just 7 months 

The first of Singapore’s cloud-native digital banks

Banking as we know it is changing.  

With the high smartphone penetration as well as changing customer expectations, the digital banking space in Asia is embracing a new wave of transformation. 

As part of Singapore's digital banking revolution, our client is part of a new digital bank venture backed by a unique cross-industry partnership between a leading financial institution and a prominent retail group in Singapore. 

The digital bank provides a range of financial services and products that integrate with the retailer's reward and loyalty programme to add value throughout the customer journey – across physical and digital touchpoints.  

The bank’s vision is to deliver a differentiated banking experience, leveraging the value of ecosystem partnerships and state-of-the-art technology to deliver a world-class customer experience – all while maintaining a high level of security.   

With a strong track record in financial ecosystems and building digital banks in Asia and beyond, Zühlke was a natural partner in this journey.  

Zühlke supported the end-to-end delivery of the new digital banking app, ensuring the timely delivery of a high-performance, secure app powered by modern cloud-native technologies. 

Building a next-generation cloud-native bank

The multidisciplinary team brought extensive engineering and software development expertise to the delivery process. Modern cloud-native technologies were implemented to provide the flexibility the digital bank would need to scale and facilitate the onboarding of new users. Crucially, this cloud-native approach would ensure the high availability and performance needed to provide 24/7, self-serve features within the app.   

Adopting practices such as test-driven development and code reviews, Zühlke played a key role in ensuring high-quality software code across both front and backend systems.  

Collaborating across teams in Asia and Europe, Zühlke was pivotal for the implementation and continuous optimisation of operational processes and provided 24/7 support for issues post-release to ensure maximum uptime.   

Adopting a customer-first approach

Delivering a first-class customer experience is key. 

With customer-centricity at its core, Zühlke focused on creating an intuitive app interface and a seamless user experience. These principles guided the development of the app’s frontend features, as well as the loyalty programme integration, ensuring a smooth customer journey.  

Customers can sign up for an account within minutes and use their digital card to make instant payments. What’s more, customers can access and redeem their loyalty points in real time, adding to the app’s ease of use.  

Zühlke collaborated closely with the project team by using an agile development and delivery approach throughout the product delivery lifecycle. This enabled rapid feedback loops between the teams, facilitating the timely delivery of new updates and features.  

Supporting a new digital banking ecosystem in Asia

Zühlke successfully designed and delivered a new digital banking app and supporting infrastructure. The result? A seamless user experience that prioritises security and stability. The cloud-first strategy also ensures that the app is future-proof, scalable and easy to maintain. 

Just 7 months after the digital bank was launched, the digital bank celebrated a milestone of over 500,000 customers. 

Keen to stay ahead of the curve in a fast-transforming future? Contact us today to discover our solutions in the financial services space.