The Bank of New Zealand is a reasonably significant shareholder in Xero and so many of us expected that they’d be working together on the odd project.
What we didn’t expect was that the bank would seemingly outsource their web design to Xero but it looks very much like they have.
This is their current personal login page;
Nothing too outstanding there, pretty standard for a banking site. But just look at what they have coming up in the next little while;
And compare that to Xero’s own login page;
The BNZ is still only showing teasers of their detail screens (see below), but the fact that they’re both breaking out of the banking status quo, and taking some obvious leads from Xero, makes me wonder just what they have brewing down in the lab.
Watch this space!
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So that’s why I can’t find any industrial designers in Wellington to hire…
It makes sense, Xero’s designs have won them quite a few awards of late, 2 Webbys being just the tip of the iceberg:
http://blog.xero.com/2009/05/xero-wins-webbys/
Not sure what the issue is here unless BNZ has their own design team they are circumventing with this move…
@Miki – hmmm, do you have some work do you? Flick me an email
@Nat – not every blog post is designed to be contentious or to rouse the rabble. No issue here just kind of interesting
It’s not very interesting if you don’t have an opinion about it, aye?
@Nat – well I think its cool. Banks tend to be pretty conservative and not overly design led. Xero is, obviously, very design led. That in itself makes for an interesting story. The shareholding and stuff just adds spice really….
See now THAT’S interesting. You should have said that in the original post. I assumed the negative without that bit of information. My mistake.
BNZ seems to understand the only way they can compete in NZ’s small market is to be designed well. They can certainly beat Westpac without having to do much more than simply create an easy to use money transfer interface! Ha.
@Nat – perhaps a reflection on your inherent pessimism
But seriously… I’m not certain that the BNZ really understand design in a holistic sense. While they’re OK, they’re not what I’d call showing thought leadership around banking… the world is changing, banks (and yes traditional media, governments most other sectors) need to innovate or die – while intuitive design is nice and all… it’ll take much more than that….
I’d say lack of intuitive design is a huge part of the problem and good design can solve it, but I don’t know if you can apply Xero’s design to a bank and have it work.
@Nat – no I’m talking way more existential than that… end of capitalist society and reinvention of the system type stuff… #hippiehatfirmlyinplace
Hm. Now I don’t know what you’re point is?
Sorry, your, not you’re.
@Nat – my points were;
1) BNZ is redesigning their site
2) They’re taking many design cues from Xero
3) BNZ is a reasonably large shareholder in Xero
4) The redesign is nice, looks intuitive
Not covered in this post were;
1) My thoughts around the economic/banking system (search my site for thoughts around that)
2) What future developments we might see from BNZ/Xero
3) My thoughts on either the invasion of Afghanistan or Iraq
4) A synopsis of the scout camp I went on in the weekend
But, just FYI, the camp was great
LOL!!!
Ha ha ha ha … love your 2+2=5 thinking
Oh, so they give up the piggies?
Joke apart, for an early example of a Bank integrating a SaaS startup’s services, look at this:
http://www.zoliblog.com/2006/09/08/your-neighborhood-bank-becomes-your-trusted-saas-provider/
Here’s hoping the functionality rubs off as well as the asthetics. With the current BNZ site you can’t change payee details on the fly when making a payment. Very annoying.
Great to see Xero making such an influence though, whether directly involved or not. Says a lot for the development team.
And Ben, I hear you’re not a shareholder. Are you mad?
@Paul – no I don’t believe that I’m mad….
mad indeed =]