A new business-banking service called Anna has launched with a design-first strategy aimed at reducing admin hassle for small UK firms.
Absolutely No-Nonsense Admin, or Anna for short, offers a current account and an app that can issue invoices, and is targeted at creative businesses.
Anna has been launched to provide banking services to creative companies
Daljit Singh, Anna's chief design officer, described the service as the world's "first design-led bank" and said: "technology isn't driving us; design is."
Bank services for creatives
He added: "We'll be launching more services for designers, artists, freelancers, who are busy and don't want to bother with admin."
Technically Anna is not a bank, but instead a combination of a business current account, debit card, app and a hybrid human and AI service that helps small businesses manage their invoicing and payments. The first 2,000 customers to register will get free use of the service for three years. The banking service is a combination of an app and a business current account
"We're a digital platform that behaves and acts like a bank," said Singh.
It differs from other financial-technology startups in that it puts the design of its services ahead of technology, he added.
Design first, tech second
"I would say that the majority of the new challenger bank organisations and fintech businesses is that they are run with technology first, and the only reason I agreed to sign up to...