Challenger bank: Product strategy and roadmap for a cryptocurrency-fiat banking app

Introduction

The client set out to develop a new challenger bank and finance management app for Android and iOS. The goal was to compete with legacy banking providers while also enabling FIAT-to-crypto transactions.

Challenges

You have two options when creating a new challenger bank:

• Build everything from scratch
• Use ready-made components from third-party providers

In 90% of cases, the second option is better because it saves valuable time. Together with the client, we chose this pragmatic approach.

Integration between components

Our main challenge was analyzing the market and choosing the right providers. We also had to manage complex integrations between components. This task was more complicated than it first appeared.

The product needed to support not only common currencies like the euro, dollar, and pound but also the Polish zloty and several Scandinavian currencies. We had to make sure the selected providers could handle all of them.

Another requirement was cryptocurrency exchange. The app had to store users’ cryptocurrency wallets, which required blockchain technology. To achieve this, we integrated with a third-party provider. This gave us a full range of functions, including wallet creation, transfer processing, transaction history access, and more.

Legal consultations

As mentioned earlier, security was designed to be the key feature of the product. To ensure this, we carried out a broad technical analysis and held extensive legal consultations. This helped us make safe choices at every stage.

The next challenge was building the customer service platform. To address it, we studied customer needs and researched which solutions would work best for the service team.

Discovering the UVP

This was not the first time Pragmatic Coders did important work before the fintech software development process even began.

We convinced the client that it was worth running a competitive analysis and market research to discover the Unique Value Proposition (UVP) for future users.

Our research showed that many users of similar apps complained about poor customer service. When financial issues arose, they had no one to turn to for help.

Armed with this insight, the client decided that excellent customer service should be the core differentiator of their challenger bank. They also set out to build a strong reputation for security and reliability.

Defining the product scope

The product was designed to compete directly with other finance apps. As a result, the scope was broad, and a significant amount of work had to be completed before the first version could be released. Together with the client, we defined the following features:

• Basic banking functionalities
• Payments using traditional currencies (FIAT) and crypto
• Mobile payment
• Digital wallets
• Payment cards that also support Cryptocurrencies
• Currency exchange:
  • FIAT →  FIAT
  • FIAT →  Crypto
  • Crypto → FIAT

Summary

So far, we have created the product strategy, completed the design, carried out technical analysis and legal consultations, and built working features. The delivered version of the app already supports cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Stellar, and work on Ethereum is in progress.