Launch of new guide highlighting opportunities and challenges of Super Apps

September 30th, 2022 | London – Global payment leader BPC and strategy consultancy firm Fincog today announced the launch of a new report to give banking providers key insights on Super Apps and the critical factors that could make them a future threat to traditional banking providers.

“Super Apps” provides a concise overview of the international ecosystem as well as the relevant regulatory factors and their role in Super App traction. Existing Super Apps have widespread adoption by combining services into a single digital interface. While Super Apps originated in Asia, they have recently been on the rise in western countries - with 67 percent of consumers in the United States reporting an interest in them.

Here are the key findings of the report:

1. Super Apps are distancing banks from their customers. Those that have entered the financial services space, such as WeChat and Alipay in China, are starting to offer customers a range of essential products.
2. A great superpower of Super Apps is to leverage their data richness to enhance services and processes. By gaining significantly more knowledge about their users compared to standard apps due to the extensive collection of customer data, they can use this data to refine their propositions and deliver a superior customer experience.
3. Super Apps are building trust and reputation in financial services. While currently, most of these financial services, such as payments, are still flowing through traditional banking and card infrastructure, Super Apps are embedding them into their convenient and carefully designed user experience, allowing them to build trust and a reputation also in the financial services space.
4. Newcomers and smaller fintechs should know that building a fully-fledged financial Super App incorporating sophisticated functions, such as lending on top of a basic wallet proposition, involves significant risk.
5. However, established institutions such as banks and payment players could see Super Apps as an opportunity to improve customer engagement, while opening new growth and revenue streams. To stay relevant in the evolving market, established financial institutions could either partner with Super Apps, providing the back end for all embedded financial services or could develop their own to improve customer engagement, while opening new potential growth and revenue streams.

“We’re thrilled to share the findings of this report which illustrate why there is growing global interest in Super Apps,” said BPC Head of Digital Banking and Super Apps, Oleg Patsiansky. “Staying ahead of the game means predicting where tomorrow will take us, as well as recognising where things currently stand. Super Apps are fast becoming increasingly attractive to a broader set of players such as banks and payment players, with more consumers starting to look positively at them and becoming willing to embrace the idea of a single app for their digital needs.”

Jeroen de Bel, Founder, Fincog said: “This joint report highlights the importance of recognising Super Apps as a significant and growing component of the broader digital financial ecosystem. We hope our insights will help businesses understand that while Super Apps are mainly designed for their consumer audience, the merchant side is just as relevant.”

BPC has built a strong reputation for understanding and mastering local banking and payment context and behavior- and is poised to take on the challenges faced in a highly digitised global economy. With 350 customers across 100 countries globally, BPC has collaborated with all ecosystem players ranging from tier one banks to neobanks, Payment Service Providers (PSPs) to large processors, e-commerce giants to start-up merchants, and government bodies to local hail riding companies, contributing to better financial inclusion using next-generation technology.