From compliance to growth: how Open Banking became a competitive advantage

As part of the PayPoint Group, obconnect has become one of the UK's leading specialists in Open Banking and Confirmation of Payee technology. Regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and processing around 35 million API calls each month, obconnect powers critical financial infrastructure for banks, building societies, fintechs and corporates across the UK and internationally. With approximately 20% of all UK Confirmation of Payee requests flowing through its platform, the company sits at the heart of the UK's Open Banking ecosystem.

In this interview, Simon Lyons of obconnect speaks with Andy Warren, who spent many years as Chief Technology Officer for Open Banking at one of the UK's top six banks. While much of the public conversation around Open Banking focuses on regulation, innovation and customer benefits, the technology required to make it all work at scale often remains behind the scenes.

Drawing on his experience building and operating Open Banking infrastructure for millions of customers, Andy shares insights into the engineering, resilience and scalability challenges that banks face. From meeting regulatory requirements to creating platforms that support everyday financial services, he explains how robust technology can transform compliance into a genuine competitive advantage.

Shift in mindset: APIs as products

Open Banking fundamentally changed how financial institutions view and handle Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). 

"Before Open Banking, APIs were just seen as plumbing – just system connections. They weren't considered a product. They weren't designed for massive industrial reuse." — Andy Warren 

With hundreds of TPPs consuming from a single, industry-standard API, banks had to start treating APIs as true products, prioritizing developer experience, onboarding ease, and system usability. 

What could have been done differently?

With the benefit of hindsight, attempting to launch Account Information Services (AIS) and Payment Initiation Services (PIS) simultaneously added unnecessary architectural complexity. Because payments took a couple of years to gain traction, focusing engineering efforts on a "thinnest possible slice" of AIS data first would have stabilised the day-one launch much faster. 

Next-Gen architecture & the "Buy vs. Build" dilemma

By 2021, the Open Banking ecosystem had matured significantly. Moving to the public cloud and next-generation builds became a more commoditised exercise, thanks to established protocols and specialist providers. 

For financial institutions looking ahead, the strategic decision comes down to what constitutes a bank's core Intellectual Property (IP): 

Building and running the infrastructure required to connect to hundreds of external fintechs and banks carries a heavy long-term operational burden. Partnering with specialists like obconnect allows banks to offload that structural complexity and focus their investments on customer experience. 

Looking forward

Open Banking is transitioning from a regulatory mandate into a purely customer-driven expectation. Customers expect seamless ecosystem integrations—whether that means viewing accounts in Apple Wallet or small businesses enjoying automated bookkeeping. 

Ultimately, if decision-makers treat Open Banking as a modernisation lever rather than a compliance tick-box exercise, it acts as a powerful foundation that makes the entire technology estate more interoperable, scalable, and ready for future innovations like AI.