Building De Novo Banks in Florida: Overcoming Tech Challenges and Learning from Nequi's Success

The resurgence of De Novo banks in the United States has rekindled entrepreneurial excitement in the financial sector, particularly in growth markets like Florida. Fueled by favorable demographics, increasing digital adoption, and a growing appetite for financial innovation, the conditions are right for launching new banks designed for a digital-first world.

But building a bank from scratch means designing for a new kind of customer, one who is mobile-native, fee-conscious, and quick to switch providers. Younger generations like Gen Z and Millennials are reshaping expectations for financial services. According to a study titled "Billions Lost: The Cost of Bankers' Myths About Americans' Finances," 63% of Gen Z and 59% of Millennials only have one checking account, while a notable percentage hold two or more, often driven by their search for lower fees (39% of Gen Z), better mobile experiences (24%), and banks with values aligned to their own (23%).

These users are no longer satisfied with traditional offerings; they're looking for intuitive platforms that align with their lifestyles and deliver instant value. For founders and financial institutions, developing De Novo banks means success will hinge on obtaining a charter and delivering a seamless, cloud-powered, and human-centered experience from day one.

At Pragma, we've seen these challenges up close. We were part of the team that helped create Nequi, a digital bank from scratch that today serves over 20 million users in Latin America. But before sharing that story, let's explore what it truly takes, technologically, to build a De Novo bank in today's market.

The Tech Challenge Behind Every De Novo Bank

Unlike traditional banks that modernize legacy systems incrementally, De Novo banks have the opportunity—and obligation—to build modern, cloud-native, API-driven platforms from day one. That blank slate is a double-edged sword: while it opens the door to innovation, it also brings immense complexity.

Here are six of the most pressing technology challenges De Novo banks must overcome:

1. Designing for Scale and Security from Day One
A De Novo bank's infrastructure must be scalable, secure, and compliant. That means building on cloud-native architectures that support modularity, microservices, and secure-by-design principles. Skimping on security or resilience in early phases can derail the entire operation.

2. Navigating Regulatory Complexity with Tech
KYC, AML, and data privacy laws are non-negotiable—and technology is central to compliance. New banks must integrate RegTech solutions and ensure their platforms provide traceability, audibility, and real-time monitoring to satisfy regulators while delivering smooth user experiences

3. Delivering Seamless, Mobile-First Customer Experiences
User expectations have been redefined by tech giants. Customers expect banking to be fast, intuitive, and mobile-first. This requires deep investments in UX/UI, but also smart architecture decisions that allow real-time data flows, instant transactions, and human-centered design.

4. Integrating with Ecosystems, Not Just Building in Silos
De Novo banks don't live in isolation; they must integrate with payment networks, credit bureaus, ID verification services, core banking engines, and more. API management, orchestration layers, and ecosystem strategies are essential from day one.

5. Preparing for the Unknown
The greatest challenge is designing for change. Markets shift, regulations evolve, and user behaviors surprise you. A successful De Novo bank must be future-ready, able to pivot, scale, and innovate without rewriting its foundation.

6. Managing Technical Debt Without Sacrificing Speed
One of the hidden dangers in launching a De Novo bank is the temptation to build fast and delay addressing core architectural decisions. While speed is essential to capture market momentum, technical debt—the cost of shortcuts taken during development—can quietly accumulate and impact scalability, security, and compliance later on.

The key is awareness and discipline. By proactively tracking architectural and code-level debt, planning for remediation, and building DevSecOps pipelines from day one, De Novo banks can strike the right balance: launch fast, learn fast, and evolve without losing agility. (For a deeper look, see: What is technical debt and how to manage it).

A Technical Blueprint: What the Nequi Case Teaches Us About Building a De Novo Bank

When we talk about building a De Novo bank from scratch, there are few more relevant and instructive examples than Nequi, Though launched in Colombia, Nequi represents everything a modern De Novo bank in the U.S., especially in innovation-forward markets like Florida, needs to be: cloud-native, mobile-first, user-centric, and built to scale fast. 

Why does this case matter? Nequi didn't evolve from a legacy bank; it was designed from zero, much like any De Novo bank built today. From infrastructure to user experience, Nequi tackled the challenges of new banks: how to serve modern users, comply with complex regulations, deploy quickly, and do it all without the burden of legacy systems. 

At Pragma, we weren't just observers; we were the tech and strategy partners helping make Nequi a reality. What follows is a deep dive into the technical architecture, tools, and agile development processes that powered one of Latin America's most successful digital banks.

From Zero to Millions

Pragma partnered across strategy, architecture, design, and development. The result? A platform that:

• Onboarded users in minutes via mobile
• Enabled zero-fee transactions, deposits, and peer-to-peer transfers
• Delivered financial education features built into the user experience
• Integrated with core banking, payments, and regulatory systems
• Scaled to serve over 20 million users

The Foundation: Cloud-Native from Day One

From the very beginning, we knew that traditional banking architecture wouldn’t cut it. Nequi was born cloud-native, with scalability, flexibility, and cost efficiency as non-negotiables. The initial infrastructure was built using Amazon EC2 and Elastic Beanstalk, and rapidly evolved to include a container-based and serverless ecosystem with:

• Containers & Functions: Amazon ECS, ECR, AWS Lambda, Step Functions
• Data & Storage: S3, DynamoDB, RDS, EBS, EFS
• Analytics & Monitoring: Kinesis, Athena, Elasticsearch, Redshift, CloudWatch, CloudTrail, EventBridge
• Machine Learning & AI: SageMaker for predictive modeling and Rekognition for user verification
• Security & Identity: IAM, GuardDuty, KMS, AWS WAF, Amazon Cognito
  Integration: API Gateway, SQS, SNS
• Networking: Direct Connect, Transit Gateway, VPN
  

This combination of services allowed Nequi to rapidly deploy new features, ensure high availability, and reduce infrastructure overhead while maintaining top-tier security and compliance.

From Monolith to Microservices

Initially, Nequi was built with application servers that managed most business logic. But as demand and functionality grew, so did the need for a more modular and scalable system. We helped evolve the platform into a microservices and event-driven architecture.

Containers became the backbone of this transformation, while AWS Lambda enabled us to run serverless functions to handle discrete business events, from customer onboarding to transactions.

Watch Nequi’s story here.

Why This Matters for Florida's Banking Innovators

Florida's unique demographic makeup, multicultural, mobile-savvy, and rapidly growing, makes it an ideal market for next-generation banks. But success in this space requires more than funding and ambition. It requires execution.

Creating a De Novo bank is an enormous challenge and an extraordinary opportunity. It's a chance to build financial institutions that are inclusive, resilient, and built for how people actually live today.

Whether in the early phases of planning, navigating the charter process, or building your MVP, we invite you to explore how Pragma can help you move faster and smarter.

Let's build a de novo bank with the future in mind—starting today.