Twelve months of engineering Freetrade
From ISAs to building our own investment platform, it’s been a busy 2019 for our team
“You can’t build an app in three months, it’s just not possible.”
“You can’t run serverless for thousands of customers, it’s just a hobby project.”
“Cross-functional teams don’t work!”
Eighteen months in, with over 70,000 customers and a team of twenty of the most talented engineers I’ve ever had the fortune to work with — I’m glad to say we didn’t listen to any of that feedback.
As we onboard our first round of Beta customers to Invest by Freetrade I’m in awe at how much we’ve achieved.
Since onboarding our first 10,000 customers at the start of the year we’ve:
- Shipped our Android app
- Added ISAs
- Added US stocks
- Added Apple and Google Pay
- Improved ETF and share discovery
- Provided investment insights
- Improved application performance
- Built an investment platform
Our team and technology have also changed to stay ahead of our customer demands. Over the same time period we’ve:
- Split into cross-functional teams focused on Growth, Discovery & Insights and Invest
- Introduced a data pipeline built on cloud composer
- Leveraged Google Firestore for Invest
- Added end to end test coverage for both clients
- Optimised our Continous Delivery pipeline to support hotfixes and fast delivery
- Formalised our design process to increase knowledge sharing as well as feedback
- Improved app quality through improved process and automation
Although the product and our teams have changed, some core tenets have remained the same over that time and will continue to guide us as we scale to the next 100,000 customers.
Bar raising
The engineering team is always getting better. We have a structured interview process to identify candidates with a strong technical and cultural fit. Undeniably this is hard to achieve but it guarantees that the team is always getting better.
Knowledge sharing
Knowledge sharing is critical to how we scale. Small cross-functional teams can execute well on problems within their domain but need guidance outside of that. Formal design review sessions and technology experts ensure everybody is in the loop.
Strong foundations
Our test coverage and bug count is constantly improving. Our platform has increased unit test coverage and introduced two sets of integration tests as well as e2e coverage. Our client’s test coverage has almost doubled since its launch. As with hiring — our codebase quality should only ever go in one direction.
Business values
Best practice and knowledge sharing in isolation doesn’t lead to any customer value though. But good foundations and knowledge sharing allow you to take calculated risks. Whether it’s moving your data pipeline onto cloud composer or experimenting with a client release, we understand the trade-offs and how to make them.
Ready for 2020
With all that experience behind us, I’m incredibly excited about 2020.
We have some challenges ahead but the team and work we’ve laid down so far mean we’re ready for anything.
Building more advanced investment features and our own API are just some of the features that we’re working on — and that will soon be available to Freetraders.
And if you fancy a challenge in 2020 then check out our careers page. We’ve got loads of open positions — from graphic design to software engineering. Good luck!
We’re on a mission to bring fee-free investing to Europe and beyond. 🔥
Freetrade does not provide investment advice and individual investors should make their own decisions or seek independent advice. The value of investments can go up as well as down and you may receive back less than your original investment. Tax laws are subject to change and may vary in how they apply depending on the circumstances.
Freetrade is a trading name of Freetrade Limited, which is a member firm of the London Stock Exchange and is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Registered in England and Wales (no. 09797821).
