In this exclusive interview, we sit down with Sophie Laurent, Director of Product Innovation at Revolut, to discuss the company’s growth, products, and positioning in the competitive European fintech landscape.
Introduction
Revolut has emerged as one of Europe’s leading neobanks since its founding in 2015. With over 35 million customers worldwide, the company continues to expand its service offerings beyond its initial focus on currency exchange.
Today, we speak with Sophie Laurent about Revolut’s journey, challenges, and vision for the future.
The Interview
On Revolut’s Evolution
Q1: Revolut started as a travel card with great exchange rates but has evolved significantly. How would you characterize this evolution?
Sophie Laurent: Revolut’s transformation has been remarkable. We began with a simple premise: eliminate hidden fees in foreign exchange. That resonated with travelers, but we quickly realized there was an opportunity to build something much bigger.
Our evolution has been guided by customer pain points. We asked, “What frustrates people about traditional banking?” and systematically addressed those issues. From currency exchange, we expanded to accounts, payments, budgeting tools, investments, and more recently, credit products and embedded finance solutions.
What’s interesting is that we’ve maintained our original DNA throughout this evolution – challenging the status quo and using technology to make financial services more accessible, transparent, and fair.
On Product Innovation
Q2: You lead product innovation at Revolut. What does the innovation process look like internally?
Sophie Laurent: Our innovation process balances customer-focused development with strategic priorities. We have formalized processes, but also encourage spontaneous ideation and rapid testing.
It typically begins with identifying customer needs through data analysis, feedback, and market research. We then create cross-functional teams to brainstorm solutions. The most promising ideas move to prototyping and testing with small user groups before wider release.
What makes Revolut unique is our speed and willingness to experiment. We can go from concept to MVP in weeks, not months. This allows us to test hypotheses quickly and iterate based on real user feedback.
We also practice what we call “innovation stacking” – building new features on top of existing infrastructure to create compound value. For example, our insurance products integrate with our accounts and payments systems to offer seamless experiences.
Q3: Which recent product innovation are you most proud of?
Sophie Laurent: I’m particularly proud of our embedded finance platform. We recognized that businesses need the same financial infrastructure that powers Revolut, so we created APIs and solutions that enable any company to integrate banking services into their products.
What makes this special is that it represents our evolution from a consumer-focused challenger to a comprehensive financial platform. We’re no longer just competing with banks – we’re providing infrastructure that enables innovation across the entire economy.
The technical challenges were significant, but the impact is profound. From small startups to large enterprises, companies can now offer sophisticated financial services without building everything from scratch. This democratizes fintech innovation.
On Market Positioning
Q4: How do you differentiate Revolut from competitors like N26, Monzo, and Starling Bank?
Sophie Laurent: Our differentiation comes from three core elements: breadth of services, geographical reach, and product integration.
On breadth, we’ve built a “financial super app” that spans banking, investing, insurance, and more recently, embedded finance. Competitors have generally remained more focused on specific verticals or core banking. This comprehensive approach gives customers fewer reasons to look elsewhere.
Geographically, we’ve prioritized international expansion. While many competitors focus on one or two markets, we’re truly global. This creates network effects – as more people join worldwide, the value of services like international transfers increases.
Finally, our integration across products creates a seamless experience. For example, our budgeting tools connect directly to transactions and investments; our crypto offering links to spending accounts. This creates an ecosystem where each product enhances the others.
Q5: Traditional banks are now implementing digital strategies. How is Revolut staying ahead?
Sophie Laurent: Traditional banks are certainly improving their digital offerings, but they face fundamental constraints that we don’t.
First, they’re burdened with legacy technology and processes. Our technology stack was built from scratch for the digital age – modular, API-first, and cloud-native. This gives us agility they struggle to match.
Second, organizational culture matters tremendously. Our teams are structured to move quickly, make decisions autonomously, and prioritize customer experience. Traditional banks have hierarchies and processes that slow innovation.
Third, we have a different business model. Traditional banks rely heavily on interest income and fees. We’ve built multiple revenue streams through subscriptions, interchange, and value-added services. This allows us to offer core banking features at lower costs.
Finally, we benefit from continuous customer feedback loops. Our digital-first approach means we gather enormous amounts of data on how people use our products, which feeds directly into improvements.
On Regulatory Environment
Q6: Revolut now operates with various licenses across Europe. How has the regulatory landscape shaped your strategy?
Sophie Laurent: The regulatory landscape has been both challenging and enabling. On one hand, navigating different regulatory frameworks across markets requires significant resources. On the other, regulation creates trust and stability which benefits established players like us.
Our strategy has evolved from working with partner banks to obtaining our own banking licenses. This gives us more control and reduces dependencies. It also allows us to offer a wider range of services like credit and deposit products.
The EU’s harmonization efforts through initiatives like PSD2 have been particularly important. Open Banking regulations created opportunities for us to integrate with traditional financial systems, offering customers better visibility and control of their finances across institutions.
More recently, embedded finance regulations have opened new avenues for growth. As regulations evolve to accommodate new business models, we’re well-positioned to benefit.
Q7: Has Brexit impacted Revolut’s European operations?
Sophie Laurent: Brexit certainly created challenges, particularly around passporting rights for financial services. We had to restructure operations and obtain additional licenses to continue serving customers seamlessly across the UK and EU.
We established our European operations in Lithuania and obtained an EU banking license there, while maintaining our UK entity. This dual-structure approach ensures we can operate effectively in both markets.
From a product perspective, we’ve had to adapt certain features to comply with diverging regulatory frameworks. This creates additional complexity but also opportunities to tailor offerings to local market needs.
Despite these challenges, we’ve maintained growth in both regions. Our European operations have actually accelerated post-Brexit as we’ve invested in local teams and market-specific features.
On Customer Experience
Q8: Revolut is known for its user-friendly app. What principles guide your UX design?
Sophie Laurent: Our UX design is guided by four core principles: simplicity, transparency, personalization, and empowerment.
Simplicity means reducing complexity even when dealing with sophisticated financial concepts. We use progressive disclosure – revealing information and options as needed rather than overwhelming users upfront.
Transparency is about making financial information clear and understandable. We use plain language, visual representations, and contextual explanations to help users understand their finances.
Personalization focuses on adapting the experience to individual needs. Our app learns from user behavior and adjusts accordingly, highlighting relevant features and providing customized insights.
Empowerment means giving users control and confidence. We provide educational content, decision-support tools, and features that help users make informed financial choices.
These principles guide everything from our onboarding flow to our most complex investment tools. The goal is always to remove friction and make financial management intuitive.
Q9: How do you balance adding new features with maintaining app simplicity?
Sophie Laurent: This is one of our greatest challenges. We want to offer comprehensive services without creating a cluttered, overwhelming experience.
Our approach has several components. First, we use behavioral data to understand which features customers actually use and prioritize those in the interface. Second, we implement progressive disclosure – revealing complexity only when users need it. Third, we personalize the experience based on usage patterns, highlighting relevant features for each user.
We’ve also introduced our subscription tiers (Standard, Plus, Premium, Metal) as a way to segment features. More advanced users can access specialized tools while casual users maintain a streamlined experience.
Finally, we continually test new interface designs with user groups before wider release. This helps us identify potential confusion or friction points early.
The balance is never perfect, but we’re committed to maintaining simplicity even as we expand functionality. When in doubt, we err on the side of simplicity and intuitive design.
On Business Strategy
Q10: Revolut has expanded into numerous countries. What determines which markets to enter?
Sophie Laurent: Our market entry decisions are based on several factors. First, we look at market size and digital readiness – populations with high smartphone penetration and openness to digital financial services.
Regulatory environment is crucial – we prioritize markets where we can operate effectively under existing licenses or where regulatory pathways are clear.
We also consider competitive dynamics. Sometimes we enter markets with strong incumbents if we believe our differentiation is compelling. Other times, we prioritize markets with less competition.
Customer acquisition costs matter tremendously. We analyze potential user acquisition channels and costs in each market, favoring those where we can grow efficiently.
Finally, we consider operational factors like language requirements, local payment systems, and support needs. These influence both entry timing and how we structure local operations.
Our most successful expansion has been in markets where multiple factors align – regulatory clarity, digital-ready populations, reasonable acquisition costs, and strong potential for network effects.
Q11: How does Revolut approach profitability versus growth?
Sophie Laurent: Our approach has evolved as we’ve matured. In the early years, we prioritized user acquisition and feature development over immediate profitability. This allowed us to build scale and establish market presence.
Today, we focus on sustainable economics while continuing to invest in growth. We’ve developed multiple revenue streams – subscription fees, interchange, foreign exchange margins, and more recently, interest income and embedded finance services.
We’ve found that premium subscriptions are particularly powerful for unit economics. Once customers upgrade to paid tiers, they typically use more services and generate better lifetime value.
Our approach isn’t about maximizing short-term profits, but rather building a sustainable business that can continue to innovate. We reinvest significantly in technology, compliance, and new market development.
The goal is balanced growth – expanding our user base and service offerings while improving unit economics and overall profitability.
On Technology
Q12: Revolut is often described as a technology company first, bank second. How does this perspective influence your operations?
Sophie Laurent: This perspective influences everything from hiring to product development. We recruit more like a tech company than a bank, emphasizing engineering talent and technical innovation.
Our development processes reflect tech industry best practices – agile methodologies, continuous deployment, extensive automation, and data-driven decisions. We release updates weekly rather than quarterly or annually as traditional banks might.
Technology isn’t just about our customer-facing products. We’ve built proprietary systems for everything from compliance to customer support, giving us flexibility that traditional banks lack.
Being technology-first also means we approach problems differently. When faced with challenges, our instinct is to build solutions rather than buy them or adapt existing processes. This creates competitive advantages through unique capabilities and intellectual property.
However, we recognize that banking requires trust, security, and regulatory compliance. We combine tech innovation with financial expertise and robust risk management. It’s this balance that makes our approach powerful.
Q13: How is Revolut approaching AI and machine learning?
Sophie Laurent: AI and machine learning are transforming every aspect of our business. We use them across four main areas: risk management, personalization, operational efficiency, and new product development.
In risk management, our models help detect fraudulent transactions, assess credit risks, and identify potential compliance issues. This protects both customers and the business.
For personalization, we use machine learning to customize the app experience, offer relevant product recommendations, and provide financial insights tailored to individual behaviors.
Operationally, AI improves our customer support systems, automates routine processes, and helps optimize capital allocation and liquidity management.
Perhaps most exciting is how AI enables entirely new products. Our investment recommendations, spending analytics, and budgeting tools all leverage machine learning to provide value that wasn’t possible before.
We’re now moving beyond supervised learning to more sophisticated reinforcement learning approaches, particularly for credit decisioning and fraud prevention. This allows our systems to continuously improve based on outcomes.
As regulations around AI develop, we’re also investing in explainability – ensuring our models can be understood and audited appropriately.
On Competition
Q14: Beyond other neobanks, who do you see as Revolut’s main competitors?
Sophie Laurent: Our competitive landscape has evolved significantly. Initially, we primarily competed with traditional banks and money transfer services. Today, our competitors span multiple categories.
In core banking, we still compete with traditional banks and other neobanks like N26, Monzo, and Starling. In payments, companies like PayPal, Wise, and increasingly Apple Pay are competitors. Our investment products compete with both traditional brokerages and newer players like Robinhood and Trade Republic.
As we expand into embedded finance, we’re competing with banking-as-a-service providers like Railsbank and Solaris Bank. Our subscription model puts us in competition with various financial service bundlers.
What’s interesting is that we often partner with companies we compete with in certain areas. This reflects the increasingly interconnected nature of financial services.
Our greatest competitive advantage remains our integrated ecosystem. While many competitors excel in specific verticals, few can match our breadth of services and seamless integration.
Q15: How do you view the emergence of embedded finance and Banking-as-a-Service models?
Sophie Laurent: We see embedded finance as both a tremendous opportunity and a potential threat to traditional financial services models.
The opportunity is that financial services can reach people in new contexts, integrated into the customer journey when and where they’re needed. This has the potential to expand the market significantly.
For Revolut, we’ve embraced this trend by developing our own embedded finance platform. This allows us to extend our infrastructure to other businesses, creating new revenue streams and distribution channels.
The challenge is that embedded finance potentially commoditizes certain banking functions. As banking features become integrated into other experiences, the direct relationship with customers could weaken.
We’re addressing this by focusing on the areas where dedicated financial apps still deliver superior value – comprehensive financial management, specialized tools, and integrated experiences across multiple financial needs.
Long-term, we believe the winners will be those who can both offer excellent dedicated financial apps AND provide embedded solutions for other contexts. We’re investing in both directions.
On Industry Trends
Q16: How do you see cryptocurrencies and digital assets fitting into Revolut’s future?
Sophie Laurent: We were early to recognize cryptocurrencies as a significant financial innovation, adding crypto trading capabilities back in 2017. Since then, our approach has evolved as the market has matured.
Today, we see digital assets as an important part of a comprehensive financial offering, but with important nuances. For many customers, cryptocurrencies represent an investment opportunity rather than a payment mechanism. Our focus has been on making crypto accessible while educating users about the risks.
Looking forward, we’re particularly interested in the intersection of traditional finance and decentralized finance (DeFi). We believe there’s potential to bring the benefits of DeFi – like programmability and composability – to mainstream financial services while maintaining regulatory compliance and customer protection.
Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) are another area we’re watching closely. As central banks explore digital currencies, we’re positioning ourselves to integrate these new forms of money into our platform.
Overall, we see digital assets as one component of a diversified financial ecosystem rather than a replacement for traditional finance. Our goal is to offer customers choice and access while navigating the regulatory landscape responsibly.
Q17: What impact do you think open banking initiatives have had on the industry?
Sophie Laurent: Open Banking has been transformative, though perhaps not as quickly as some predicted. It’s created new opportunities for customer-centric innovation while challenging traditional banking models.
For customers, Open Banking has improved financial visibility and control. People can now see all their accounts in one place, make more informed decisions, and switch providers more easily.
For the industry, it’s accelerated the unbundling and rebundling of financial services. Specialized providers can now access account data and payment rails to build focused solutions. Meanwhile, companies like Revolut can aggregate these services into comprehensive offerings.
However, implementation challenges have slowed adoption. Technical issues, inconsistent APIs, and varying regulatory approaches across countries have created friction.
Looking ahead, we believe Open Banking will evolve toward Open Finance – extending similar principles to investments, pensions, insurance, and other financial products. This will create even more opportunities for innovation and customer empowerment.
Revolut has benefited from Open Banking both as a consumer and provider of APIs. It’s reinforced our strategy of building an interconnected financial ecosystem rather than a walled garden.
On Leadership and Culture
Q18: How would you describe Revolut’s company culture, and how does it influence innovation?
Sophie Laurent: Revolut’s culture is defined by ambition, speed, and customer focus. We often describe it as “getting stuff done” – prioritizing outcomes over process and moving quickly to seize opportunities.
This culture directly enables innovation by removing barriers between idea and implementation. Teams have significant autonomy to experiment and iterate. We celebrate learning from failures as much as successes.
Our flat organizational structure means ideas can come from anywhere. Junior team members regularly contribute significant innovations because they’re encouraged to challenge assumptions and propose better approaches.
Data plays a central role in our culture. We make decisions based on evidence rather than hierarchy or intuition. This creates space for unexpected insights and challenges conventional wisdom.
The culture isn’t without challenges. Our pace can be demanding, and we’ve had to invest in work-life balance as we’ve grown. But the core elements – ambition, speed, customer focus, and data-driven decisions – remain essential to our continued innovation.
Q19: What leadership lessons have you learned during your time at Revolut?
Sophie Laurent: My time at Revolut has taught me several important leadership lessons. First, the power of clear vision combined with detailed execution. Ambitious goals only matter when paired with practical implementation plans.
Second, the importance of building diverse teams. Our most innovative solutions have come from teams with varied backgrounds, perspectives, and expertise. Cognitive diversity drives better decision-making.
Third, the value of customer obsession. When we’ve struggled, it’s usually because we’ve lost sight of real user needs. When we’ve succeeded, it’s because we’ve solved genuine pain points.
Fourth, the necessity of balancing speed with sustainability. Early on, we sometimes moved so quickly that we created technical or operational debt. I’ve learned to distinguish between healthy speed and harmful shortcuts.
Finally, the critical role of continuous learning. In fintech, the landscape changes constantly. Leaders who stop learning quickly become obsolete. I dedicate significant time to understanding emerging technologies, regulatory changes, and evolving customer behaviors.
On the Future
Q20: What’s your vision for Revolut’s future over the next five years?
Sophie Laurent: Over the next five years, I envision Revolut evolving from a neobank to a comprehensive financial platform that serves both consumers and businesses globally.
For consumers, we’ll continue expanding our “financial super app” concept, adding more sophisticated investment options, personalized financial planning tools, and integrated insurance products. The app will become increasingly intelligent, using AI to provide proactive guidance rather than just reactive information.
For businesses, our embedded finance platform will become a major growth driver. Companies across industries will use our infrastructure to integrate financial services into their customer experiences. This B2B2C model will extend our reach far beyond our direct user base.
Geographically, we’ll continue global expansion, with particular focus on North America and emerging markets in Asia and Latin America. Each market will have locally relevant features while maintaining a consistent core experience.
Technologically, we’ll further integrate AI throughout our products, moving from descriptive analytics (“what happened?”) to prescriptive guidance (“what should you do?”). This will create truly personalized financial experiences.
The boundary between traditional financial services and other aspects of life will continue to blur. Revolut will be at the forefront of this integration, ensuring that financial services enhance rather than complicate people’s lives.
Throughout this evolution, our mission remains constant: building a fair, accessible financial system that empowers people to get more from their money.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What makes Revolut different from traditional banks?
Revolut differentiates itself through its digital-first approach, comprehensive feature set, transparent pricing, and global focus. Unlike traditional banks with legacy systems, Revolut built its technology stack from scratch, allowing for greater agility and innovation.
Is Revolut profitable?
According to Sophie Laurent in this interview, Revolut has evolved its approach from growth-at-all-costs to sustainable economics. The company has developed multiple revenue streams including subscriptions, interchange fees, foreign exchange, and embedded finance services, focusing on balanced growth rather than maximizing short-term profits.
How does Revolut approach cryptocurrency?
Revolut was an early adopter of cryptocurrency trading (2017) and sees digital assets as an important part of a comprehensive financial offering. The company focuses on making crypto accessible while educating users about risks, and is particularly interested in the intersection of traditional finance and decentralized finance.
What are Revolut’s main challenges?
Based on the interview, key challenges include balancing feature expansion with app simplicity, navigating complex regulatory environments across multiple markets, competing with both specialized fintechs and traditional banks, and maintaining innovation speed while ensuring operational stability.
Where is Revolut expanding next?
While specific markets weren’t named in the interview, Sophie Laurent mentioned that Revolut is focusing on continued global expansion, particularly in North America and emerging markets in Asia and Latin America, with plans to offer locally relevant features while maintaining a consistent core experience.
