A new bank, "light, scalable and easily exportable", 100% controlled by Unicredit and with the goal of having one million customers in Italy within 5 years. It is Buddybank, the group's 'molecular' bank which, once the authorizations from Bank of Italy and the ECB have been obtained, will be operational from 2017 January XNUMX.
The investment for Unicredit is 50 million over five years and break even is expected in the third year with 300 customers. With Buddybank, explains Angelo D'Alessandro, creator and manager of the project, Unicredit "will be able to enter new markets without acquiring new banks, but thanks to a new business model".
Buddybank is designed exclusively for smartphones and will offer customers three classic financial products (current account, credit/debit card and personal loans up to a maximum of 25 euros) and a concierge service operating 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Italy, it will be the turn of the United States, where buddybank expects to land at the end of 7, but future openings are also being evaluated in Europe and Africa.
Buddybank, thanks to partnerships with operators specialized in various sectors, aims to accompany customers in operations such as restaurant and holiday reservations, also through the granting of pre-approved credits (based on the customer's risk assessment), peer to peer lending (but not in Italy, where it is not possible) or money remittances sent by emigrants to their countries of origin.
The institute, which starts with a team of 42 people (who in turn will also take care of the concierge service) and aims to have 100 by the end of the five-year period, will have a cost/income ratio of 30% and thanks to the innovative business model aims to serve 10 customers per employee, compared to 200 for a traditional bank.
Furthermore, Unicredit has opened the new Unicredit Italia profile on Twitter to "be a bank ever closer to people in everyday life - said Gabriele Piccini, country chairman Italy of the institute - capable of suggesting concrete solutions on how better address needs and requirements. In the era of continuous interaction, made possible by the growing diffusion of technological tools and social networks, the opening of this new profile, primarily aimed at our customers, bears witness to this closeness and the strategic importance of digitization processes".
