Next Level Banking

Back in 2015 – and after years of de-centralised global growth, legacy systems and the absence of a unified design strategy – Standard Chartered was suffering from an uncoordinated and ineffective ecosystem of public websites and digital services.

Working alongside their central offices in Singapore and their technology teams in Hong Kong and Chennai, Hanzo helped the bank’s senior management engineer a future-proof strategy and a digital ecosystem that aimed to support global growth, more efficient new market colonisation and a much more agile process to launch new products.

Starting with a comprehensive research phase, Hanzo aided SC’s design and technology teams in creating a global Design System based on carefully differentiated ‘Pre’ and ‘Post’ login moments and a well-defined channeling of the Personal, Private and Business banking segments.

After only one year, Standard Chartered was able to create, build and launch a consistent digital experience, as well as a progressive ecosystem of digital products and services. All sharing the same centralised modular layout and codebase, no matter the country or the language used.

Whether they are withdrawing money from an ATM, checking their account balance or applying for a new credit card, SC customers must feel a consistent experience across all digital touchpoints, internationally. Pulling this off required not only a big strategic and technological effort but also a rethinking of Standard Chartered’s visual identity, which despite being recognisable worldwide, it was not well adapted to the digital age.

Our team started by refreshing SC’s wordmark and colour guidelines, and followed by introducing SC Sans, a customized, geometric typeface with a modern, digital-savvy tone of voice. Comprehensive guidelines for color, layout and screen typography were created, all mapped to a library of CSS ready-to-use styles.

To wrap up the identity package, we created a book with content guidelines and templates and a curated library of content assets such as photography, illustration, video or a bespoke iconography containing hundreds of banking metaphors.

The result is a sharper and more deliberate visual language that leverages existing recognition while allowing the brand to scale in new ways.

Standard Chartered invested more than 1.5 Billion dollars in technology in 2016. One of the objectives of such a bet was going completely “paperless” in all of their transactions. Keeping that in mind, Hanzo helped envision, build and launch Retail Workbench: A digital tablet-based sales-and-service tool that “brings the bank” to clients.

Integrated with the bank’s back-end infrastructure, it enables advanced paperless product acquisition, banking product catalogues and portfolio management for any segment client in any location worldwide.

Retail Workbench was originally launched in South Korea, where the bank says it cut account opening time to less than five minutes and credit card issuance and personal loan application and disbursement to less than 20 minutes. It was later expanded worldwide to Asia, Europe and Africa.

During our long-term partnership with Standard Chartered, Hanzo nurtured a close relationship with the bank’s technology departments, providing services such as technical consultancy, front-end development and the creation of high-fidelity functional prototypes among others.

Our technology teams had a relevant role in enabling Standard Chartered to separate their front-end layer from their outdated legacy systems and centralise it in a Design System that populated a wide array of services, products and product acquisition forms.

This accelerated the development and global implementation of their new digital channels, drove speed and revenue and ultimately, created a more consistent and enjoyable Customer Experience.