When thinking about love, open banking isn’t the first thing that comes to mind. However, its spirit can undeniably be sensed in the open banking “air,” too. How else do we explain plain fintech’s desire to bond, forge partnerships, and drive innovation together?
Salt Edge sat down with Achim Thienel, Director, Product Management, Universal Banking at Finastra, to discuss how Finastra views our partnership’s journey, its impact, and the exciting future ahead.
Back in 2021, amidst a financial world rapidly evolving and embracing digital transformation, Salt Edge and Finastra crossed paths. The two of them united forces to help banks and Electronic Money Institutions (EMIs) worldwide speed up compliance with PSD2 and other open banking regulations.
By combining Salt Edge’s Open Banking Compliance solution with Finastra’s core banking platforms, Fusion Essence and Fusion Equation, the duo empowers institutions to build the necessary architecture to meet end-to-end banking requirements and compliance through a single API.
In the realm of fintech, finding the right partner is equal to meeting a soulmate, one whose strengths and principles perfectly complement your own. What brings Salt Edge and Finastra together is a shared foundation of values: a customer-centric attitude, responsibility, collaboration, and innovation. These values are at the heart of the partnership, much like trust and accountability are the pillars of any long-lasting love story.
Achim Thienel: “Finastra is a global provider of financial services software applications across Lending, Payments, Treasury and Capital Markets, and Universal Banking (retail and digital). Backed by our commitment to unlocking the potential of people, businesses and communities everywhere, we are empowering financial institutions to deliver advanced user experiences through robust technology and collaboration.”
“Customer-centricity and collaboration are at the heart of what we do, as we work closely with our customers, partners and the wider financial services community to address the industry’s most pressing challenges. By harnessing the power of APIs, Cloud and AI, we help our customers accelerate their agility and business growth while delivering frictionless, personalised, and end-to-end experiences, all at a decreased total cost of ownership.” – notes Achim
Finastra’s commitment echoes Salt Edge’s mission to reshape the digital world by creating and interconnecting regulated and private APIs. Like Finastra, Salt Edge acts as a technological bridge, empowering businesses with cost-effective payments, efficient data, and financial asset management while paving the global shift towards Open Data.
“Finastra Universal Banking enables retail and commercial banks to reimagine banking by adopting robust technology solutions that help them cater to diverse customer needs. For example, our flagship solution, Finastra Essence, is a cloud-first, next-generation core banking solution that combines rich, broad, and deep functionality with advanced technology to increase enterprise agility, reduce costs and improve operational efficiency. Powered by an open, microservices architecture, Essence’s rich, broad, and deep banking functionality enables institutions to rapidly deploy market-leading products and services.” – adds Achim
Achim Thienel: “We selected Salt Edge as our partner due to its proven track record and robust capabilities in delivering open banking API solutions, having delivered APIs for many financial institutions worldwide. Its decade-long expertise, one-stop-shop open banking platform, and the top-tier performance of its solution create an attractive offering to complement ours, enabling banks to grow their customer base through effective data aggregation solutions. Additionally, Salt Edge’s robust international security standards played an important role in our decision to partner with them.”
What key challenges in the open banking space are you seeing?
Achim Thienel: “A big challenge when it comes to open banking adoption is that traditional banking sectors are still burdened with legacy systems. Transitioning from these systems to an open banking model can require significant investment in technology, talent, and a cultural shift towards more open collaboration with fintechs and third-party providers. Another significant challenge is regulatory compliance. Banks in regions with strict regulations may encounter difficulties in deploying open banking solutions that meet both regulatory requirements and customer expectations. As a result, some banks have adopted a gradual implementation strategy rather than immediate, comprehensive adoption.”
How did this partnership with Salt Edge help overcome these challenges?
Achim Thienel: “One way that we are addressing this at Finastra is by promoting a Symbiosis approach to core banking transformation. The traditional “rip and replace” strategy can exceed budgets, delay timelines, and occasionally fail completely. Instead, with Symbiosis, banks can deploy a next-generation core banking system alongside their existing one. This enables them to implement a new system for a specific segment, such as lending, without overhauling their entire infrastructure. This strategy can simplify data migration and support the adoption of open banking.”
“We are also addressing several key challenges through our partnership with Salt Edge. For example, our customers can seamlessly comply with cross-bank and pan-European API standards for our customers, such as Open Banking UK and The Berlin Group in the EU, and adapt to requirements in newly regulated markets like Australia, Brazil, and the GCC. The integration of Salt Edge’s solutions into Finastra’s suite of core banking solutions also provides advanced security measures, including Third-Party Provider (TPP) verification systems and mobile-first applications, ensuring our customers can comply with strong customer authentication (SCA) and dynamic linking requirements.” – mentioned Achim
A partnership is only as strong as the impact it creates. Together, Finastra and Salt Edge have helped financial institutions and fintechs worldwide embrace open banking regulations with confidence. One standout success story is their collaboration with BKN301 Group.
Achim Thienel: “The partnership between Finastra and Salt Edge has proven successful across the European, MEA and APAC markets. For example, the BKN301 Group is a London-based Banking as a Service (BaaS) technology provider dedicated to empowering the financial industry with the innovative and scalable BKN301 BaaS Orchestrator platform. BKN301 Group implemented Finastra Essence, integrated with Salt Edge’s Open Banking Compliance, to deliver new digital payment capabilities and accelerate its deployment of a BaaS solution for the EMENA region. As a result, the company recently enabled their customer in Egypt to offer an intuitive bill payment app—simplifying bill payments using their BaaS offering.”
How does Finastra see the partnership evolving in the future, especially in the context of current industry developments like PSD3 and open finance?
Achim Thienel: “Finastra’s fintech ecosystem plays a crucial role in helping our customers adapt to new demands. As various industry developments progress, we are continuously exploring opportunities to add new partners to our ecosystem and expand our relationships with existing ones. It’s about finding the right partners that complement our offering to ensure that we continue to deliver superior, personalised, and highly relevant banking products and services.
For example, new waves of technology are happening at a rapid pace. Technology such as Generative AI (Gen AI) has found fame most recently, but it certainly won’t be the last. It’s therefore extremely important that we augment our solutions with the latest technology to remain futureproof while ensuring our customers have easy access to third-party solutions that do the same.”
“Additionally, the third Payment Services Directive (PSD3) enhances security, transparency, and efficiency in payment services. For banks, this means better protection against fraud, more control over their data, and clearer information on fees and transactions. To comply with PSD3, banks need to implement stronger authentication methods and standardised APIs for better communication with third-party providers, adopt advanced fraud prevention systems, and establish consent management systems for data sharing. These changes aim to create a safer and more transparent banking environment for clients.” – also points out Achim
“As open banking and Open Finance progress in regions around the world, particularly as new government or industry initiatives arise, our partners, such as Salt Edge, can play a valuable role in ensuring that our customers remain compliant with the local regulations or guidelines.” – adds Achim
If “love can change the world”, then in the fintech landscape, open banking regulations certainly serve as Cupid’s arrows, guiding institutions toward a more connected and open financial ecosystem. Whether this is fate or a well-aimed arrow, Finastra and Salt Edge have built a strong alliance.
Together, they make open banking more accessible, delivering reliable and innovative services to financial institutions worldwide. And just like in any lasting relationship, they’re committed to growing, embracing new chapters, and reshaping the way banks, EMIs, and fintech interact, ensuring secure, standardised, and consumer-centric data sharing.
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