Financial Services Leading DevOps Adoption across Europe, finds Claranet

Almost half of financial services firms have implemented DevOps, underlining its value for industries facing disruption

Financial services organisations are adopting DevOps approaches faster and with more decisiveness than organisations in other industries, in what appears to be a bid to adapt to disruptive conditions in the financial services industry. This is according to research by managed services provider Claranet.

Vanson Bourne surveyed 900 end user IT leaders from mid-market businesses in six European markets – Germany, Benelux, France, Spain, Portugal, and the UK. Focusing on DevOps adoption, it found that 45 per cent of financial services organisations have already developed a DevOps approach. By comparison, only 32 per cent of organisations in a variety of other industries, including retail, software, and digital and media, have done so.

Michel Robert, MD of Claranet UK, commented on the financial services industry’s inclination towards DevOps: “FinTech startups are using technology to shake things up in the financial services industry with a customer-centric, agile approach. For the big incumbents in the industry the adoption of DevOps suggests a change in mindset and is likely being used as a way of taking on these startups and learning from their innovations.

“By encouraging faster software and application development, DevOps enables financial services organisations to streamline the way they deal with the vast quantities of data they process internally. Vitally, it also enables them to rapidly develop new products and services, allowing them to compete with the FinTech disruptors.

“Despite being encumbered by legacy IT approaches and siloed data, as well as strict regulatory and security necessities, the financial services industry is ahead in the DevOps game. This demonstrates that DevOps is not only capable of speeding up development time, but is also an approach that prioritises application and data security, a factor that is closely monitored in financial services.”

Financial services organisation who have not yet adopted DevOps are also much more likely to have plans in place to eventually develop capacities. Whilst almost 25 per cent of the overall sample stated that they are either not planning to implement DevOps or haven’t yet made a decision, only 12 per cent of financial services organisations are in the same position.

According to Michel, financial services organisations’ embrace of DevOps demonstrates how digital disruption necessitates new ways of working: “Startups use the internet to remove friction, overturn legacy distribution methods, and create new business models. It’s vital that incumbents are ready to compete – and this means being able to bring their full IT capabilities to bear when streamlining their operations and launching new products and services. DevOps enables them to do so, creating a culture where developing, testing, and making new applications and software rapidly and securely is the norm.

“Much of the financial services market is vulnerable to disruption and the dominant players have organisational, cultural, and regulatory impediments to rapid change. This complexity is an impetus to move faster, and taking a DevOps approach can unlock new opportunities for growth. Other industries facing disruption, from retail to media, would do well to look to DevOps as a means of getting ahead of change,” he concluded.