The Story Behind Nerve, Kuda’s Custom Core Banking App
In 2020, the engineering team at Kuda built a core banking application that transformed our services.
The Origin Of Nerve
On August 30, 2020, we launched our custom-made core banking application called Nerve to manage account information, transfers and connections with our banking partners.
Built over several months by our engineering team (all Nigerian talent at the time), Nerve replaced a third-party software we had used since August 2019 because that software could no longer meet our fast-growing needs. 🚀
Beyond replacing the third-party software, Nerve was built to give us the freedom to design more flexible internal applications for better services.
Fun fact: The name ‘Nerve’ comes from ‘nerve centre’, which means “the control centre of an organisation or operation.”
A Serious Upgrade
The transition to Nerve took eleven tense hours — a downtime that lasted from 11:00 pm on August 29, 2020 to 10:00 am on August 30, 2020. 😬
Even though no one could use Kuda during the downtime, we got tremendous support from dozens of people on social media and we can say for sure that the effort it took to make the transition has paid off. 👏🏾
The Difference Is Clear
Since we moved to Nerve, our dependency on third parties has reduced significantly, transfers have become more reliable and we’ve been able to sign up more people easily.
Nerve has also been a key part of the success of Kuda Overdrafts, making it easy for anyone to repay their overdraft by just adding money to their account.
As Kuda expands to other countries, Nerve will be the glue that holds our operations across the world together and the foundation of our planned support for multiple currencies in the near future.
A big shout-out to the twelve-person team that worked on Nerve, and to everyone who stuck with us through the stutters and glitches of the pre-Nerve days. 💜
