The silent dependency on third-party technology has long been the Achilles’ heel of the fintech industry, creating a fragile foundation where a single external failure can cascade into widespread service disruptions for millions of customers. This inherent vulnerability places financial institutions in a precarious position, balancing innovation against the operational risks of outsourced core systems. For embedded finance company ConnectPay, addressing this fundamental challenge meant more than just an upgrade; it required a declaration of technological independence.
This move signifies a critical shift away from reliance on outside vendors, a strategy increasingly seen as essential for survival and growth in a tightly regulated landscape. By taking full control of its technological backbone, ConnectPay is not only safeguarding its operations but also positioning itself to lead in an industry that demands unprecedented levels of agility and resilience.
The Inherent Dangers of Outsourced Technology
For many fintech companies, the architecture of their services rests on technology they do not own or control. This reliance on third-party providers introduces a significant, often underestimated, operational threat. An outage, a security breach, or even a minor update from an external vendor can have an immediate and direct negative impact on the end customer, disrupting payments, freezing accounts, and eroding trust.
This external dependency creates a critical point of failure. When a system goes down, the fintech company is often left waiting for a third party to resolve the issue, with little ability to intervene directly. This lack of control is a substantial liability in the financial sector, where uptime and reliability are paramount to maintaining customer confidence and regulatory compliance.
Responding to an Industry Demand for Resilience
The financial industry is currently facing immense pressure to fortify its operations against systemic risks. Growing resilience and regulatory demands require institutions to have a deep, granular understanding and control over their entire technology stack. Dependence on external providers complicates this, introducing a layer of abstraction that can obscure potential weaknesses and slow down response times during a crisis.
Meeting these modern standards with an outdated, outsourced model is becoming increasingly untenable. Regulators expect swift resolutions and robust security measures, which are difficult to guarantee when the core infrastructure is managed by another entity. This environment has pushed forward-thinking companies to reevaluate their foundational strategies, recognizing that self-reliance is no longer a luxury but a necessity for long-term stability.
Introducing Mars: A New Era of Independence
In a decisive move to address these challenges, ConnectPay has launched Mars, its new proprietary in-house core banking system. This platform is the company’s solution to the vulnerabilities of technological dependency, designed to provide complete control over its operational environment. The transition to Mars marks a fundamental shift in how the company builds, deploys, and maintains its services.
The primary benefits of this technological sovereignty are threefold. First, it delivers enhanced stability and security by allowing ConnectPay to fortify its own systems without external constraints. Second, it enables unprecedented agility, shortening product development timelines from months to mere weeks. Finally, it ensures swift problem-solving, as technical issues can be identified and resolved internally, dramatically reducing downtime and improving the client experience.
An Industry Wide Shift Toward Self Sufficiency
ConnectPay’s strategic pivot is not happening in a vacuum. It reflects a broader, industry-wide trend toward in-house development as a means of gaining a competitive edge. According to CTO Tadas Bakutis, bringing the core system in-house eliminates the “single biggest operational risk an EMI can have,” a sentiment that resonates across the fintech landscape.
This movement is substantiated by the actions of other major industry players. Established companies like Solaris and disruptive innovators such as Chime, with its ChimeCore platform, have made similar strategic migrations. Neobank giant Nubank also built its success on a proprietary technology foundation. These examples underscore a growing consensus: to truly lead in the modern financial ecosystem, owning the core technology is essential.
The Modern Playbook for Fintech Autonomy
Developing a proprietary core has become a crucial chapter in the modern fintech playbook for achieving long-term success and autonomy. This strategic investment provides the foundational control necessary to navigate an evolving market, allowing companies to innovate at their own pace and respond dynamically to new opportunities and threats. It is a definitive move from being a technology consumer to a technology leader.
The outcomes of this approach were clear: increased agility to outmaneuver competitors, robust stability to build lasting customer trust, and a sustainable competitive advantage rooted in technological independence. By taking ownership of its core infrastructure, ConnectPay not only mitigated its most significant risk but also laid the groundwork for future innovation and scalable growth in a demanding global market.
