Simple.pl - Business Finance App

Simple.pl was designed by a group of people with over 20 years of experience in finance and financial intermediation. It is an application that allows entrepreneurs to determine the exact creditworthiness of their company. Thanks to an extensive form, which is connected with machine learning solution and external databases (e.g. BIK, KRD), the customer knows within a few minutes what kind of financing he can get while having full knowledge of the company's financial liquidity. The solution examines six different factors, analyzing and evaluating the chances for a loan and giving the exact amount that the company can get. Additionally, each of the parameters is supplemented with personal recommendations, and the customer has also access to the credit analyst from the system level.

Simple.pl from the very beginning was supposed to be a system integrated with a large number of external solutions and databases. This assumption resulted from the need for accurate analysis of customer capabilities. In addition, these integrations had to be designed in such a way that the data was properly secured and the response time was short, so that the customer received the report in two minutes maximum. During a series of meetings we discussed the assumptions and functional scope together with the client and third parties involved in the work. We planned the implementation schedule by dividing the individual works into sprints, and also created a detailed gantt chart, which enabled us to control the progress of work on the part of our team and the client. Such an approach resulted in the success and timely implementation of the solution.

The whole project was divided into sprints according to the SCRUM methodology. Particular modules of the system were implemented in such a way as to be compatible with the functioning of the second back office system of the client, to which data from applications is exported. While carrying out the programming work we also put a special emphasis on the security of the system and the protection of sensitive user data.

The client asked us to perform the following work:

• Detailing the application vision presented to us and clarifying business objectives (preparation of BRD).
• Translating together with the client the described vision into application functionalities (preparation of RDF).
• Create technical documentation of the project, needed to start programming works and to integrate with other solutions (preparation of TRD).
• Support of a third party company in building a proposal of application visualization on the basis of FRD document.
• Assistance in preparation of a target graphic design of the application.
• Carrying out programming work according to SCRUM methodology.
• Production implementation and integration with external and internal systems of the client.

During the realization of the work we encountered a number of challenges that arise in such complex fintech projects. At the initial stage (the so-called discovery) it was particularly important to organize the vision presented to us. Our experience shows that this is the most important phase in the project implementation, which has a decisive impact on its proper execution. During a series of workshops we defined the final shape of the functionality in response to the previously defined business needs of the client. First of all, we made sure that they were understandable for all project stakeholders, so that both we and the client knew what we would get at the end.

Another particularly important element was the look of the application. There are already many solutions on the market from our competitors that look great. We wanted the design of the application to put appearance and functionality on an equal footing, so that the customers would not get lost in the application and fill out the various steps of the form. This is especially important when we consider the customer purchase path for such a specific service as loans. Each of its stages has different characteristics and we should speak to the customer in a different way. Presenting particular messages to the buyer must be well-thought-out and shown in such a form as to evoke trust and a sense of security. Of course we were aware that the moment of receiving the report and moving on to the offers is equally important, so together with the third company we designed the final screens in such a way as to maximally encourage the user to finalize the transaction and use one of the presented solutions. During workshops with the client and the third party we managed to create a project of a web application that met all these assumptions and at the same time perfectly fit into the assumed visual identity.

Another important element was the application's environment. The client had many internal systems (including another one created by our company) which were integrated with external solutions, such as BIK, KRD, Kontomatik or Infomonitor. The entire process of registering a user into the system and collecting data from the user form had to be integrated. Another challenge was to transfer data between systems so as to generate a report for a client in less than 2 minutes. We were particularly concerned about linking up with the machine learning system so that the process of analyzing the client's data was as fast and stable as possible.

The client expected fast implementation, determining the short time for implementation by the planned start of the solution's advertising campaign. Knowing this thoroughly, we took care of the efficiency of the team's work and constant communication with the product owner on the client's side, which allowed us to implement the solution on time. The project also assumed the simultaneous analysis of a large amount of data and many integrations, which we had to take into account during the programming work. Thanks to a precise division of tasks, designing connections between particular functionalities and data, our team managed to complete the project without any problems and according to the original assumptions.

We can divide the whole conducted work into three stages:

• Workshops: Before starting the project, we conducted a workshop in which we created a list of functional requirements (FRD), in response to business requirements (BRD). At this stage, we also defined the scope of the system architecture (TRD). In this way, we aligned the scope of requirements with the client's needs. We better understood the objectives and found a way to achieve them.
• Development Phase: Working with an external company to refine the UX design and the underlying graphic design of the application corresponds to the client's visual identity. We took care of the legibility of the content in the application. During the development process we focused on 1:1 mapping of the client's expectations for particular screens.
• Implementation and integration with the client's systems: Thanks to the analysis during the workshops, we got to know the details of the systems used by the client. A detailed description of the application architecture helped us to efficiently implement and integrate it with systems outside the product.

The project involved a team of 6 people including a project manager, backend and frontend developers and a tester. Due to the sensitive data that customers provide when going through the application, we relied on a large number of functional, automated and security tests.

We implemented the project in:

• PHP
• Laravel
• React (TypeScript)
• NextJs (JavaScript)

Simple.pl according to customer expectations allows automatic verification of creditworthiness of the company. We met the main business assumption of the client, that the report with the state of finances is displayed to the user in less than 5 minutes. As part of the client's business needs, the application realizes several of them, namely:

• the ability to present the company's loan offerings,
• current communication with customers via e-mail and system messages,
• possibility of presenting the offer of external entities.