Banking 4.0: Digital Ecosystems and Super-Apps

Banking 4.0 is characterised by digital innovations, fusing the physical, artificial, and biological worlds, affecting societies, industries, and companies with ever higher speed and intensity. In the process to a new world order with new competitive forces and uncertainty, where goals are continually changing, and resources must be flexibly reorganised, there is no room for traditional ways of strategic thinking. With old management concepts, linear value chains, and rigid and closed organisational structures, established firms will be the losers. This article explains why the banking industry is ripe for disruption. It introduces a conceptual framework based on a case study research of Chinese juggernauts, including value constellations, platform business models and super-apps. Our journey from the industrial economy to the digital era opens up new vistas on how to create and capture value for businesses and clients of the next generation. We describe why modern leaders must embrace change, learn from Asia, and develop strategies through the lens of the ecosystem theory. Digital ecosystems focus on clients and data and consolidate interconnected goods and services. To achieve sustainable financial growth, we suggest an agile management approach that takes the digital transformation as a chance and builds upon partnerships to connect with diverse actors—technologically, socially, and culturally.