DKB cuts costs by 30% with pioneering nearshore tech hub in Valencia
30% Cost Savings
The new nearshore tech hub in Valencia delivers 30% permanent cost savings by leveraging local talent and adopting modern, efficient processes.
Fast Team Growth
Within weeks, 35 team members joined the Valencia unit, ensuring rapid ramp-up and immediate impact on software quality.
Strategic Talent Mix
The multidisciplinary team structure - 30% senior, 30% mid-level, and 40% junior - ensures a balanced skill set for sustainable growth and innovation.
We have already completed several successful projects with GFT, so we knew that it had the right mix of business and technical skills to deliver our project on time and to budget. But, just as importantly, GFT had the right service culture to be our trusted partner on such a critical strategic project.
Challenge
Build a new development centre to attract tech talent and boost efficiency
Deutsche Kreditbank (DKB) is one of the largest direct banks in Germany. Its goal is to further expand its range of services for private and business customers with a focus on sustainable, digital financial services. However, at its headquarters in Berlin, DKB was faced with rising costs and a tight labour market, which made it difficult to attract and retain qualified specialists. The bank, therefore, decided to set up a tech centre in another region in order to take advantage of cost benefits and drive technological developments through new methods and processes.
GFT was already known to DKB, having delivered some successful technical projects for the bank. DKB admired GFT’s approach and ability to deliver quality applications quickly and cost-effectively. As Valencia has a large pool of IT specialists, DKB approached GFT with a view to jointly establishing a new technology location outside Germany. The aims of the project were to increase efficiency and establish the DKB brand in a new region.
Engagement
Valencia - a strategic nearshore choice for agility and innovation
After careful consideration of potential locations, DKB decided to work with GFT in Valencia – a top-tier nearshore destination offering the ideal mix of cost efficiency, talent access and geographic proximity. The city is home to several prestigious universities and works hard to attract foreign investment through its Invest in Valencia agency. Recently, it has become a vibrant technical ecosystem for companies and entrepreneurs and has a reputation as a fine city in which to live and work. With a strong local brand and substantial presence in the city, GFT is known as a good employer and a great place to work. GFT also has unparalleled local market knowledge and was ideally placed to recruit the right talent. New employees would have immediate access to GFT’s expertise and proven training methods to help them become fully operational quickly.
The partners agreed that GFT would establish, operate, and later transfer an independent development unit for DKB (BOT model – build, operate, transfer), which would initially be based at the GFT site. The plan was to map the entire software development cycle on site and integrate the centre into DKB as a fully-fledged location. Thanks to the local labour market and the use of new methods, the software development centre will achieve permanent cost savings of around 30%.
Building a successful team from the scratch
GFT took full responsibility for the development and success of the project right from the start. The concrete goals for the first ten months were:
- Completely rebuild the technology centre
- Assemble a multidisciplinary team of over 50 software architects, DevOps developers, programmers, database experts, UI/UX designers and software testers
- Balance: 30% experienced experts, 30% with medium experience and 40% junior talents
Following the initial recruitment, GFT would assemble a high performing team that would be able to build on GFT's capabilities. The team would be flexible to respond to DKB's business needs and GFT would provide operational expertise and technical know-how, as well as promote new ways of thinking in banking.
Effectively, the employees were employed by GFT to work for DKB as an exclusive client. DKB was keen to have a dedicated team of technical experts in Valencia who would bring fresh ideas and modern methods to application development. It would work closely with the Berlin office and in due course replace the existing team of service providers and freelancers.
Thanks to its strong local presence, GFT was able to recruit the best specialists. Transparency was the key to the project's success - the new employees knew from the outset that they were working exclusively for DKB and would be part of our team in the long term.
Benefit
Starting point for a new era in DKB applications development
Recruitment of the new team was swift with 35 members joining within the first few weeks. Although GFT was responsible for hiring, recruits were fully aware that they would be working exclusively for DKB and that they would become employees of the German bank in due course, probably within 24 months.
From the very beginning, the team worked according to the GFT approach, which is based on agile methodologies, DevOps, and continuous delivery. The initial focus was on increasing efficiency through the use of new technologies.
Within one month of recruitment, the new team delivered a noticeable improvement in applications development noticeable in terms of quality and quantity of software.
With this new development centre, DKB is playing a pioneering role, it is the first German direct bank to take this step. Thanks to the collaboration with GFT, the project was implemented within a few months instead of several years.
With this project, we have not only achieved our goal of significantly reducing costs, but have also become pioneers; we are the first German direct bank to establish this innovative nearshore model, thereby providing a new impetus for our business.
With DKB, we have realised a showcase project in Valencia within just a few months: 30% cost reduction, state-of-the-art application development and a sustainable impetus for digitalisation in banking.
