Westpac is spreading its net wide in the search for fresh mobile banking apps by soliciting ideas from outside the bank through a competition.
The bank says it will "crowdsource" ideas for mobile banking apps from New Zealand developers and designers. In return they're being offered the carrots of cash and the chance to "take their app to the world." Westpac says the objective of "the Westpac App Challenge" is for developers and designers to use their experience as bank customers, alongside their professional skills, to make a process or service faster and easier via a mobile app.
Simon Pomeroy, Westpac's head of digital who joined the bank last year after previously working for Air New Zealand including as head of loyalty, says the competition is open to individuals, teams and organisations.
"From the entries, at least five will be chosen to give a 15 minute presentation of their concept to a panel of judges from which at least two will be chosen to be developed," says Pomeroy.
"The developers or designers of the selected apps will each receive $10,000 and will have the opportunity to work with Westpac while it is implemented (with funding to come from a special $50,000 development fund). They will retain ownership of the intellectual property rights in the app which they can then utilise outside New Zealand and Australia."
The move comes with Callum Wilson, Westpac's general manager for customer strategy and experience, having recently told interest.co.nz the bank will unveil "big changes" in mobile banking before the end of the year including "game changing" developments.
1 Comments
Nice to see both remuneration and IP protection from a crowdsourcing project.
Often, crowdsourcing means that companies are basically looking for people to work for them for free, as unpaid external contractors, to come up with ideas so they don't have to pay for them.
Of course crowdsourcing can be great for a young person to get a good start or gain experience, but, if not structured well, it's also got the morally-dubious undertones of internships, which really polarise critics as to their ethical status...
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