Case Study: Driving innovative solutions from within a leading investment bank

Engagement overview

South Africa is experiencing accelerating disruption within the financial services industry. Game-changing innovations and digital transformation have altered customer preferences and expectations. With disruptors entering the market and changing customer appetites, established financial service providers have recognised the need to evolve their offerings to remain relevant and competitive.

The client understood the need for innovation and change and recognised that it needed tools to create momentum to disrupt internal conventional thinking. They needed an internal innovation hub, an incubator for disruption. The hub needed to have the ability to develop technologies internally, allowing for solutions to be built, tested and refined quickly and effectively. Application maintenance support solutions were required to ensure these technologies were sustainable and had the longevity to support the businesses’ growing needs. Guidance was required on prioritising and identifying possible future solutions, positioning the banking company on a future innovation path.

The client chose to partner with BSG on key actions within their proposed vision. With an innovative team working both onsite and remotely, BSG collaborated with the client to build a unique, innovation platform where products and solutions can be developed. The platform, a first of its kind for the banking company,was entirely bespoke, allowing for the development of a diverse range of fit-for-purpose solutions. All solutions developed on the platform could integrate, creating efficiencies by reusing modular components.

BSG supported the client to develop a set of innovative solutions using leading technologies like Kubernetes. BSG assisted with the development of four products to date, all in various stages of completion. All of these products reduce manual processes, simplifying and automating labour and time intensive tasks.

Through the development process BSG embed DevOps principles to ensure the continuity of effective development and deployment. Development velocity was increased through infrastructure automation, continuous deployment and by bringing the operations team closer to the programming teams. BSG empowered the client to deliver on the proposed business and technology architecture. Working collaboratively with a diverse team of stakeholders to execute and implement the business vision, showing incremental value.

BSG has been tasked with piloting a smart and automated application maintenance support solution for one of the products developed on the innovation platform. BSG will pilot this first for the client, providing outsourced support by using intelligent automation and streamlined processes. As BSG’s role within the engagement developed, we were positioned as more than an implementation partner. Pulling on our experience and industry knowledge, BSG was able to transition to an advisory role, helping to guide possible solutions and priorities for future innovation.

Making a difference

Making a difference in communities

The establishment of an innovation hub and the subsequent innovation platform and products have empowered the client to protect themselves from being disrupted by competitors by rather being able to disrupt themselves. This internally generated disruption allowes them to position themselves competitively, moving away from reactionary change, to proactively driving an innovation agenda.

The client developed the capability to effectively create innovation solutions, products and offerings. The innovative platform will allow the creation of digital channels and technologies that are based on evolving business needs. Changing customer preferences can be addressed and improved customer experience
created.

To affect change the innovation hub needed internal buy-in and investment. The implementation and advisory work BSG is doing has positioned the unit to create confidence in its ability to deliver, motivating additional investment from three distinct business units.

Increased automation allowed the rationalising of resources, delivering increased process efficiencies and reducing labourious manual task demands on personnel. This has freed up personal to focus on higher priori ty, more profitable transactions.

Chief Executive Officer

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