Deutsche Bank desires loyalty with Yunar app launch
Deutsche Bank has launched its Yunar app as it seeks to make loyalty schemes easy to use.
The basic version of Yunar will enable users to manage their customer loyalty cards on their mobile phone. The app allows users to collect points for up to 200 loyalty schemes that are used in Germany, including Payback, DeutschlandCard, BahnBonus, Miles & More, Ikea, Douglas and Karstadt.
The bank is starting with a basic version as a free digital platform offering. It has plans to add other unspecified banking and non-banking services over time.
The Yunar brand name is derived from “yuna”, the Celtic word for desire
Yunar will be continually upgraded with new functions and products, “taking into account what customers want and how they use the app from day to day”.
Markus Pertlwieser, chief digital officer of Deutsche Bank’s Private & Commercial Bank and head of the Digital Ventures business, says: “Fresh ideas that make life easier for banking clients will be implemented faster in future, regardless of whether we act on our own or together with partners.”
The start-up behind the Yunar brand is a wholly owned subsidiary of Deutsche Bank, with its own management, its own IT and an initial staff of around 80 people.
The bank says the new company does not require a banking balance sheet, “as is the case with many fintechs”. Subject to the approval of the relevant regulatory authorities, it will hold a so-called ZAG licence – ZAG means Zahlungsdiensteaufsichtsgesetz (Payment Services Oversight Act) – authorising it to provide payment services.
In Germany, Deutsche Bank’s Private & Commercial Bank has 20 million clients, of whom more than ten million use the bank’s products and services via PC, tablet and smartphone.
Yunar is part of the Private & Commercial Bank’s new “Digital Ventures” unit, where the offerings for new client groups and markets will be bundled in future. One of its tasks is to develop the bank’s digital platform.
The Yunar brand name is derived from “yuna”, the Celtic word for desire. At the same time, Yunar is also an allusion to the phrase “you know”. The bank explains that the brand name is thus intended to emphasise that Yunar knows what customers want and fulfils these desires.
In Q1 2019 the app will be made generally available in the iOS App store and the Google Play Store.
