What I would do in 1 week with an Open banking API.
Over the period of 2014 I was introduced to the concept of entrepreneurship, I had always wanted to do something but didn't know what. A lost soul. Now things are different but I want to point something out.
The idea is simple
Change the way people look at their money.
Ask yourself the following:
- Do you have a bank account?
- Do you keep a mental note of how much money you have in a ‘mental ledger’?
This is pretty much everyone.
Finno aims to change the way people look at their money by providing the one number that matters, not how much you have but how much you can spend.
So this is what needs to be in an app, we all know that moment where some small detail was forgotten and at the end of the month we need a new pair of shoes but don't have enough. (I pitched investors once in socks to prove this)
One app, for two purposes.
- You open it and see how much more you can spend today.
- When something happens in your account, you get a push “Yo, something has happened that you might want to look at”
Introducing Finno
This little guy was going to be one to do it, designed by my good friend: James Herd.
It is simple.
I did my business model canvas, I did my customer validation.
Yes it was a little forced, but the idea resonated with people, I was asked “I need this, when can I download it?”
I pitched an executive board within ING (large bank in NL) where they said:
Look, we like it, we like you, we love your passion but if you go away and build this app then MAYBE we will release some form of API.
Great. Thanks. I do not want to do this half-arsed, and who in their right mind would believe that they said that.
I could not find a team that would want to work on him properly full time, juggling with my education;
I quit.
I gave up, I did not want to take on the industry. The mathematics in this app can be proved in Excel and the numbers are useful. No “to big to fail bank” offers such a service.
But……..
I knew that one day this day would come and with todays announcement that the UK goverment is pushing for an open API, it will. There is hope that one day Finno can become a reality: Something super simple but has almost endless extensions.
