Guiding discovery to reveal hidden opportunities.
Discovery played a key role in shaping and guiding a series of high-impact initiatives; efforts were aimed at identifying unmet user needs and uncovering where real value could be created within the bank’s evolving service landscape.
“We thought we knew what users needed from our digital banking platform — until we actually started testing. What they really wanted turned out to be simpler, more human, and surprisingly different than we’d imagined.”
By applying structured discovery practices, ecosystem mapping, and rapid prototyping, we helped the SEB team challenge assumptions, broaden their perspective, and zero in on opportunities with both business viability and user desirability.
Designing the mobile experience
As banking increasingly moved into customers’ pockets, SEB faced the challenge of translating complex services into intuitive mobile experiences — without sacrificing trust, compliance, or clarity.
But mobile is not just a smaller screen. It’s a different context entirely, with shifting user expectations, moments of use, and cognitive bandwidth.
“The challenge wasn’t just about fitting things on a smaller screen. It was about rethinking how banking fits into people’s lives. That shift—from layout to lived context—was where the real design breakthrough happened.”
Our mission was to help SEB explore what mobile-first could really mean for their customers — and how the bank could deliver more with less.
How might we match a world class desktop experience for the mobile use cases?
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SOLUTIONS
Building solutions fit for real life — not just roadmaps and slide decks.
Rather than rely on assumptions or internal consensus, SEB engaged our Head of Experience to co-create real, testable solutions in short, high-intensity bursts. We didn’t just suggest what could work—we helped prove what would.
Through a mix of field research, journey mapping, and rapid prototyping, we worked hand-in-hand with internal teams to reimagine key flows, simplify interactions, and solve for moments that actually matter in users’ lives.
These efforts culminated in a series of McKinsey-style RPDs (Rapid Process Digitisation)—precursors to our modern Lab as a Service model—where we explored new value paths, ran real-world discovery, and validated working prototypes within 16-week windows. This approach allowed SEB to uncover genuine user needs, test product-market fit early, uncover novel value-adding opportunities, and refine concepts iteratively before investing in full development.
“We made sure to not get stuck in slide decks or vision documents. These were functioning prototypes, built with users, tested in context, and ready to grow. As always, that made all the difference.”
These mini-labs also gave the bank excellent starting points to scale into full service offers, fit for their existing ecosystem, and allowed the bank to not only accelerate time-to-insight, but also dramatically reduce the risk of misaligned initiatives by validating concepts with real customers before committing to full-scale development.
By embedding experimentation and co-creation into the process, SEB accelerated time-to-insight, dramatically reduced delivery risk, and built services that were not only innovative—but aligned with how customers actually behave, decide, and bank. This work also set a new bar internally for how SEB teams approach mobile design — grounded in context, backed by insight, and rigorously tested.
Reframed mobile banking as a context-specific service, not just a smaller UI
Identified hidden friction in key flows like login, transfers, and authentication
Built high-fidelity mobile prototypes validated with real users
Established mobile design principles that could scale across SEB units
Helped internal teams shift mindset from “responsive design” to “mobile-native thinking”
Prototyped new mobile-first flows with direct user input
Validated new product ideas in <16 weeks via Lab-style RPDs
Built internal alignment around real, working concepts—not hypotheticals
Balanced customer desirability with technical and regulatory feasibility
Delivered a proven blueprint for fast, low-risk innovation cycles
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RESULTS
More Trust, More Deals
With their new, more user focused site the bank has consistently been voted best-in-class, and have built credibility matching their existing physical service offer with both enterprise clients and private customers.
No.1
Bank in Nordics
3x
Engagement
-90%
Reduced Touchpoints
