Investors in Māori-owned open banking gateway BlinkPay found assurance in a technical due diligence report authored by software specialist Company-X.
BlinkPay is a payments technology company at the forefront of developing payment services in Aotearoa New Zealand in partnership with banks. Its payment services are modern, secure, faster, and cheaper than many other payment options available today.
Company-X was asked to conduct robust technical due diligence and produce a report for BlinkPay investors on its work to date, and recommendations on its open banking product development roadmap.
Open banking is when banks enable other financial services providers to connect to your account with your consent enabling them to offer you bank-integrated financial products and services. BlinkPay needed an independent company to review its technology platform and approach on behalf of investors who did not have a deep understanding of payments technologies
BlinkPay Product Officer Adrian Smith was referred to Company-X and began the conversation with Company-X co-founder and director David Hallett and senior consultant Ben Judge.
“Ben was really considered and shared the lenses for doing review on the tech due diligence,” Smith said.
“Ben had this assuredness about himself.”
Company-X needed to produce a technical due diligence report that was consumable by an internal technical audience but also understandable for an external funder.
“It was a review as well as a recommendation of things we could do to enhance our ability to execute against product delivery,” Smith said.
Another challenge was defining what success looked like for the due diligence report. A completed software product is different to a completed software product with users.
Company-X asked Smith and BlinkPay Chief Technology Officer Chris Riddell to complete a comprehensive technical due diligence questionnaire.
“It looked at: What are the ways in which you go about things? How do you construct your products? How do you create a product backlog? How do you decide what technologies to use? How will you figure out which technologies you may need to use in the future? It was a bit of a thought exercise, but it also caused us to stop and reflect,” Smith said.
“It really forced you to say this is how we do things. Oftentimes people just go through life, do stuff, and don't really think about it. So, I found it a useful exercise to stop and reflect on our processes, our policies, and the way we develop things.”
Company-X Solutions Architect Rachel Primrose reviewed their answers and prepared a list of supplementary questions before conducting follow-up interviews with them both. Primrose sought further clarification before authoring the comprehensive report based on her findings.
The report found BlinkPay’s governance model was more mature than most organisations its age and size thanks to its team’s experience and the sector it was operating in.
The report also made recommendations around what resourcing to prioritise in key areas where growing and scaling the company was the near-term goal.
“Rachel asked intelligent questions, born of her experience, that forced us to pause and double check our assumptions and beliefs. This was valuable because often-times in a start-up, you make a quick decision and then attempt to execute at pace. Slowing down long enough to reflect is a valuable exercise, and that’s what the technical due diligence enabled us to do,” Smith said.
“The report also highlighted that there's some areas where we don't have a dedicated person because we're a small team and suggested we get technical specialists in some key areas,” Smith said.
“It also suggested things we need beyond technical skills to continue to grow and scale our business.”
“The quality of the report was top notch. Company-X demonstrated deep knowledge around how we can potentially build out our business in the future, that aligned to much of our own thinking. Ben is an absolute credit to Company-X, and Rachel really knows her stuff. Our experience with Company-X has been absolutely exemplar.”
