Challenge Summary
Welcome to the Dinnaco - FinTech Ecosystem Website Challenge! In this challenge we are looking for your UI and UX ideas for a responsive website to become a place for different groups of people in the FinTech ecosystem to connect. We want to see your best UI and UX ideas to make the site engaging and easy to use. A simple and intuitive experience will be key to getting people to use the site again and again.
We are focusing on a responsive web design with tablet experience being key (so Tablet devices / screen size should be your focus). If you have time we would also like to see mobile versions of the design but please concentrate on a great tablet experience.
In the sections below we have outlined a number of potential screens, key functionality we are looking to include on the website and initial thoughts on which screens might be best display the each element of functionality. If you think there are better ways structure the site then please explore those ideas and concepts. We want you to bring your creativity and provide us with a range of engaging and exciting web site designs.
Concepts that are hard to navigate or overly clutter the screen are likely to score less well than a clean, simple, and easy to use website design.
As always, please ask any questions in the forum. Looking forward to your design concepts!
Round 1
Submit your initial designs for Checkpoint Feedback.
As a minimum we require the following screens to be provided as part of your round 1 submission:
01: Home / Landing Page
02: User Profile Page
06: Full Calendar View
07: Full Event View
- You must upload your submission to InvisionApp so we can provide direct feedback on your designs.
- Please request an InvisionApp link from the Copilot through the challenge forum.
But please feel free to provide any additional screens necessary to explain your concept.
Notes.jpg: Please note any comments about your design for the Client
Make sure all pages have correct flow! Use correct file numbering. (00, 01, 02, 03)
Round 2
Your Final designs for all required screens, with all Checkpoint Feedback implemented.
You must upload your submission to InvisionApp, for the final submission
- you can reuse the prototype that you shared for checkpoint
- Final Winners (top 3 placements) will be required to create hotspots / link pages in invisionapp of your submission and you will receive a bonus of $100 for this task!
But please feel free to provide any additional screens necessary to explain your concept.
Notes.jpg: Please note any comments about your design for the Client
Make sure all pages have correct flow! Use correct file numbering. (00, 01, 02, 03)
Background Information:
We want to create a website which becomes a space where different stakeholders across a regional FinTech Ecosystem can connect and collaborate. This includes (but is not limited to) people from:
- financial institutions (banks, insurers, asset managers);
- FinTech startups;
- academia;
- investors;
- incubators & accelerators;
- service suppliers;
- system integrators; and
- Government & public sector agencies
Who are interested in engaging in the FinTech world. The website will allow users to engage and interact with other people or companies in the ecosystem; find interesting events and content; advertise and find services they require.
Key functionality:
The website requires two sections
1) a public landing page with minimal features for members and non-members
2) a secure login section with extensive services for members (i.e. the user is required to complete a secure login process to access these areas)
Non-logged in features (members and non-members)
- Vision statement: Our vision: To become a global leader in Fintech innovation and development
- Mission Statement: Our mission: To create an integrated Fintech ecosystem through provision of funding, support, infrastructure and talent that recognises and responds to the needs of each stakeholder, and connects our region to other global FinTech centres
- Adverts for FinTech - an area to showcase the various FinTech companies and specialties to the general public public
- FinTech news - a space to share the latest in FinTech news through posts and the sharing of articles. The articles will be displayed as a ticker (title and article summary) that links to the full article within the site or an external site. Some articles will be available to all, whilst access to certain articles can be restricted to members only.
- Ecosystem map - a listing of organisations in the FinTech ecosystem, which also allows users to overlay the ecosystem over a geographic map of the region (please use Scotland for this challenge) to highlight location and proximity. In addition Members (once they have signed in) will have access to the organisations contact details and a list of individuals associated with the company
- Blogs - the opportunity to post blogs with opinions and insights into FinTech. These blogs can be shared to members only or to the wider general public. Some example blogs are provided below:
http://www.engage-sbs.com/the-future-is-fintech/
http://www.investinedinburgh.com/invest-blog/scottish-financial-enterprise/
- Calendar of events - a calendar with all upcoming events e.g. meetups, conferences, regulatory, or hackathons. Some events will be visible to the general public, whilst some will only be visible to logged in members. Each calendar listing should link to detailed event information and the event registration page (in both cases these could be links within the site or to external sites).
- Social media links - Social media links (twitter, facebook LinkedIn etc.) and links to the FinTech Website twitter and LinkedIn pages will be accessible via logos at the bottom of each page.
Logged in features (members only)
- Network Charter – during the registration process, members must agree to follow the key principles of the charter, the principles can be viewed via a page which lists them. This is very similar to terms and conditions on a typical website.
- User profiles - each member will have a Facebook-style user profile including a profile photo, full contact details and the areas of FinTech they are involved in or have an interest in. The user profile should provide the ability to tag the member as having specific skills or providing services e.g. Mentoring. These should be displayed as icons on the user profile
- Profile search functionality: Members can search for others using any profile data e.g. by name, company, fintec area, skill, and are then able to filter the results. For example the user might search for ‘blockchain mentor’, or search for ‘blockchain’ and then filter the results for profiles tagged as a mentor. The final result should be the same.
- User matching - a feature similar to “People you may know” in LinkedIn, suggests members from similar individuals in the ecosystem that the user may find it interesting to interact with
- Direct communication - a private platform to directly communicate with individuals or groups within the ecosystem in a similar fashion to Slack
- Forum communication - a forum which will allow members to ask questions to the whole ecosystem as well as facilitating general conversations (potentially using a dedicated LinkedIn Group).
- Testing showcase and recruitment - a platform to share new FinTech ideas, propositions or MVPs and to find members who will be willing to brainstorm, test or demo them. The portal should allow users to upload challenges and invite members to pitch ideas or respond to the challenge
- Document library - a library of Fintech documents and resources, making it easy for all areas of the ecosystem to access help and supporting documents. Must include search facility e.g. by name, description, date and ecosystem group. An example search term: “regulatory advice around PSD2 from Service Suppliers”.
- Services directory - a directory of all support services available to members, including funding, legal and regulation
- Advice pages - Pages with advice and support on specific tricky FinTech topics such as legal, procurement, government & regulation, funding process and stages of seed investment, PR/marketing, contract negotiation etc
- FinTech news (global) - a space to share the latest in global FinTech news –to help keep members up to date on the latest advances in global FinTech
Design & Branding Guidelines:
- The branding on this challenge is pretty open. We have provided a colour palette, font, logo and some example iconography to use in the attached file. Please use the colour palette, font and logo at a minimum
- Font type is Avenir
- Remember that we want a site that is clean and easy to navigate and understand
- Tablet (orientation up to the designer) - landscape (1024 x 768px) or portrait (768px X 1024px)
- Mobile (only if you have time, portrait preferred) - 640px width (height can extend as needed)
Required Screens:
The below screens list out a minimum set we would like to see at full submission. We have not described a page for the direct communication feature as we would like you to explore different concepts for building it into the overall concept.
01: Home / Landing Page:
Screen is shown when the user lands on the site for the first time or when they click the 'Home' icon (which must be displayed on all screens including home / landing page) and must contain:
- Key information about the FinTech website i.e. what it is for, who uses it etc.
- Be really engaging and exciting - we want people to love the site
- Contain the following specific features:
- - - Vision and mission statements
- - - Space to contain adverts
- - - Summary news feed
- - - Link to ecosystem map
- - - Summary view / ticker of upcoming events
- - - Social media feed / ticker
- - - Summary blog feed
- - - Provide links to sign up / login and visit other public pages
Where no text has been provided you can use "Dummy Text" (Lorem ipsum) as content. You may be asked to modify this content on final fixes.
The following list provides some example articles titles and summaries to include in the news feed:
New Fintech Group Meets
A new group to develop Scotland’s financial technology (FinTech) vision meets for the first time tomorrow in Edinburgh. SFE’s FinTech Strategy Group brings over 30 leading industry figures from financial technology disciplines together with representatives from Government and higher education.
Fintech is alive and well in Scotland, with Edinburgh leading the charge
The tech sector in Edinburgh now accounts for 1 in 8 businesses, and according to the 2016 Tech Nation Report, Edinburgh is the largest technology cluster outside London in terms of productivity.
LendingCrowd thinks outside the bank using the power of the crowd
Peer-to-peer firm LendingCrowd was quick to attract investment to grow in Scotland's niche crowdfunding sector. The company also had the vision to appreciate the vast fintech potential here, which thrives on over 1,000 tech firms, together with 600 financial and business companies.
Why haven't you invested in Scotland's blockchain sector yet?
Can you hear it? That's the sound of the guys working on the chain. Blockchain to be precise.
Edinburgh to host global blockchain tech conference
More than 200 attendees from around the world have already signed up to take part in a conference being held in Edinburgh next month to discuss the development of blockchain technology.
02: User Profile
- This screen will provide a user profile which is editable by the user and viewable by other logged-in members of the site
- The profile will contain features such as:
1. Contact information including company
2. Areas of FinTech they are involved in e.g. blockchain, credit risk, trading, value management, insurance (e.g. automotive, travel, pet) etc.
3. Photo
4. Personal social media feeds
5. User matching section i.e. recommended connections like Linkedin “People you may know”
6. Publish blogs / articles - i.e. allow the user to publish a personal blog, which are tagged to categorised against key topics or themes and hashtags, which allow them to be searched
03: Profile Search Functionality
This screen allows logged-in members to search for other members
- Ability to search based on any profile data e.g. name, company, FinTech area, skill
- Ability to filter the search results
- Search results should also have some indication of different ‘roles’ that people’s profiles have, for example icons that indicate ‘mentor’, ‘founder’, ‘incubator’
For example the user might search for ‘blockchain mentor’, or search for ‘blockchain’ and then filter the results for profiles tagged as a mentor. The final result should be the same.
04: Forums
- Ability to post and collaborate with other members around questions or challenges
- Could be broken down into topics around different issues by some form of tagging system
- Doesn't have to look or behave like Quora or StackOverflow!
05: Testing Showcase and Recruitment
- This screen allows logged in users to share their upcoming propositions or products and recruit members of the ecosystem to test and feedback
- Will involve a screen to post ideas and then a series of other screens to manage and provide feedback
- You are not required to show the whole process flow!
06: Full Calendar View
- The full calendar view will display a whole month and allow people to see which events are on each day and then click on the event for a full event view (Screen 7)
- The full calendar view will have some way of classifying different types of events (meetups, regulatory, hackathons or conferences), by use of colour or iconography
- You can move forward and backwards between months
- Each event on the calendar will have the event title, maximum 150 characters
Please the following events in your calendar:
1st December
- Play & Work with Open Data
- Edinburgh Tech Drink Thursdays!: Have a drink and talk about tech goings on in Edinburgh and further afield
- The 'How to hack your home' tour 2016/17 from the Royal Institution
- SFE Young Professionals Event - Progressing your Career in Financial Services
6th December
- Glasgow Defcon DC44141: DEFCON Glasgow: Share a drink and some great chat
- 57North Hacklab: Open Night
- Edinburgh Hacklab: Open Night
- Falkirk Linux Users Group Meeting and Talk
8th December
- ScotRUG: Scottish Ruby User Group (Edinburgh)
- SFE Breakfast Briefing on The New Data Protection Law: How will it affect the Evolution of Financial Services?
9th December
- Open Data Crash Course
13th December
- PyLadies Edinburgh: Coffee, cake and code
- 57North Hacklab: Open Night
- Edinburgh Hacklab: Open Night
20th December
- edPUG - Edinburgh PHP User Group: edPUG - The Edinburgh PHP User Group
- Edinburgh Clojurians
- 57North Hacklab: Open Night
- Edinburgh Hacklab: Open Night
26th December
- Edinburgh UX meetup: Edinburgh UX monthly meetup
07: Full event view
- The full event view will show the event title, location, date and time, description text, a link to the full event website (typically an external website) and a button to add to calendar
- The full event view could be an overlay on the full calendar view or a new page
- Sign up fields (please include: name, email, contact phone number)
- Please use the following information to populate the event page:
PyLadies Edinburgh: Coffee, cake and code
Monthly meetup on the second tuesday of each month. This is a chance to meet and chat with like-minded women interested in coding in an informal environment.
Bring your laptop to work on your own projects, get help, or collaborate with others, or just bring yourself if you just fancy a chat. All levels are welcome, from total beginners to experienced professionals. We welcome all women. Men are welcome with a PyLady chaperone!
Tue 13 Dec 2016 6:30pm to 9:30pm
08: Document library
- The document library will provide a space to find and view interesting content
- On the document library page the user will be able to see different content items and search / filter to find what they are looking for
- Each document shown will have the document title, a single sentence description and a preview image shown
- The user can click on the document to view the full document which will be a link to an external site so doesn't need to be shown in the submission
09: Other pages
- There are a number of other features which may require their own screens but could re-use a similar style / page design which include Services directory, Advice pages, Global FinTech News. We haven’t asked for specific screens but it would be great to see some ideas for presenting this info in an interesting and easy to consume way.
Inspiration from elsewhere:
Examples of FinTech hub / incubator websites:
Level 39 (London) http://www.level39.co/
MaRS (Toronto) - https://www.marsdd.com/
FinLeap (Berlin) - https://www.finleap.com/
The Floor (Tel Aviv) - http://thefloorhub.com/
Stock Artwork:
We are allowing stock photos and stock icons for this challenge please follow the following guidelines:
- Stock Artwork policies: https://help.topcoder.com/hc/en-us/articles/217481408-Policy-for-Stock-Artwork-in-Design-Submissions
- Latest Design Policies: http://help.topcoder.com/hc/en-us/categories/202610437-DESIGN
Target Audience:
- Stakeholders across the FinTech ecosystem
Judging Criteria
We will be judging on:
- How well your design aligns with the objectives and requirements of the challenge
- Cleanliness of your screen design and user flow
- Overall design and user experience relevant to the data
- New ideas and concepts
Submission and Source Files
Preview Image
Please create your preview image as one (1) 1024x1024px JPG or PNG file in RGB color mode at 72dpi and place a screenshot of your submission within it.
Submission File
All requested contest requirements/screens as JPG or PNG files at 300dpi. Number and Name your files appropriately to aid in the review process. This is very important.
Source Files
All original source files for the submitted design. Files should be created OR in Adobe Photoshop as a layered PSD file or sketch.
Final Fixes
As part of the final fixes phase, you may be asked to modify your graphics (sizes or colors) or modify overall colors. We may ask you to update your design or graphics based on checkpoint feedback and instructions.
Please read the challenge specification carefully and watch the forums for any questions or feedback concerning this challenge. It is important that you monitor any updates provided by the client or Studio Admins in the forums. Please post any questions you might have for the client in the forums.