Читать книгу Embedded Finance - Scarlett Sieber - Страница 24

Shamir Karkal remembers the early days when the idea for Simple emerged:

I was chatting with Josh who was (and still is) a good friend. And he sent me this email saying, “Let's start a retail bank.” I remember this was 2009, and we spent a lot of time chatting about the financial crisis and everything that had happened from ’07 to ’09. It wasn't completely out of the blue for him to talk about entrepreneurial ideas with me, but, starting a retail bank was like, what was out there? He laid out this vision of how customers hated existing banks. The whole financial model of banks was built around trying to sell more products to customers and charge them more fees. What customers wanted had not been articulated, but what customers wanted was financial wellness, and they wanted to have access to their money, and really to live a better life. There was such a deep disconnect between what banks were selling and what customers were asking for. And Josh's idea was, “Hey, let's just build a simple, easy-to-use customer-friendly bank that held your money, helped you pay your bills, gave you loans when you needed them, and then got out of your way and let you live your life.” And it was just such a compelling idea. I read that email and I was, like, “Oh man, we should do this now.” Facebook and Twitter were already beginning to take off. And yet most banks did not even have a mobile app at that point.

Josh and Shamir launched a website saying, “Hey, we're going to build a better bank. If you like the idea, drop your email and we'll add you to the waiting list.” 200,000 people signed up before the company launched a product.

Simple offered a number of innovative features, including displaying a “safe to spend” amount, to help customers stay on budget, and also put a great deal of thought into the customer experience, including customer service, and both Shamir and Josh logged many hours and late nights helping their early customers solve problems. Simple was ultimately sold to the global bank BBVA.