Business Report on Revolut: SWOT Analysis, CSR, and Innovation

This business report provides an analysis of Revolut, including a SWOT analysis, corporate social responsibility, and innovation and creativity within the organization.

Business Report

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
Analysis...........................................................................................................................................4
SWOT Analysis of Revolut.............................................................................................................4
Corporate social responsibility by Revolut......................................................................................5
Innovation and creativity in Revolut...............................................................................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
RECOMMENDATION.................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Report overview
Business report refers to evaluation of a particular issue, set of circumstances and financial
operations related to a business organisation. This business report aims at discussing internal and
external circumstances of Revolut by application of SWOT analysis and will also discuss about
corporate social responsibility of company along with innovation and creativity within
organisation.
Business overview
Revolut is a British financial technology company, founded in 2015 by Nikolay Storonsky and
Vlad Yatsenko and is headquartered at London, England, UK. Revolut operates in FinTech
industry and products of the company involve current accounts, debit cards, stock trading,
currency exchange, foreign exchange and insurance.
Structure
Structure of the company involves functional structure and there are 7 members in board of
directors and along with this in executive leadership there are 17 members for different
functional area within company.
Location
Services of Revolut involve peer-to-peer payments and currency exchange and company employ
around 1596 employees. Services of Revolut are available in Europe, America and Asia pacific.
Finance
Revolut is a start-up that is based on funding and total funding raised by company is £627
million and in this fund raised in 2020 is £383 million and revenue of the company is £58.24
million (Browne, 2018).
Competitors

Main competitors of the company involves Brain Tree, Green Dot, Monzo Bank, N26. These
companies are Fintech companies of America, UK and Germany that are competitors for
Revolut.
Analysis
SWOT Analysis of Revolut
Strengths
 Effective range of innovative services in finance – This means that Revolut offers several
services to attract customers from different segments. Innovative services of Revolut are
29 different currencies and offers cryptocurrency exchange
 Large number of users- Revolut has its operations in Europe, America and Asia pacific
and Revolut has more than 12 million personal customers, more than 500000 business
customers
 Offer effective security options – offers instant payment notification and security features
involve freezing consumer card via app
 Cheapest while sending money to abroad – This means that compared to some of the
competitors of company its services of sending money to abroad are cheap
Weaknesses
 Consumers of the company are not protected by Financial Services Compensation
Scheme- This means that competitors of company provide security to its customers by
financial services compensation scheme (Phadermrod, Crowder and Wills, 2019).
 Does not offer telephone number for contacting – This means that in order to contact with
Revoult no telephone number has been provided and can be only contacted through
online chat
 Charge downgrade fees when customers want to close their account or convert to cheaper
account – This means that when customers are willing to close their account and want to
switch to a cheaper account

 Advertising campaign of Revolut was accused – This means that advertisement campaign
of Revolut was accused of shaming single people
Opportunities
 Expansion of Revolut in more countries – This means that Revolut can expand more on
international scale and along with this emerging economies and developing nations are
also an effective opportunity for Revolut
 Increasing number of users preferring online and application banking – This means that
people now a days are using mobile application for banking services and this is an
opportunity for Revolut
Threats
 Strong Competition - Competition for Revolut is not limited to FinTech organisations and
companies but also is from big and established banks who have managed to create a
brand image for their organisation (Vlados, 2019). Other than this, traditional banking
organisations are also investing in technology oriented services increasing competition
for Revolut
 Recession – This means that recession has negative impact on financial conditions of
organisations and users and Revolut is also likely to get affected by recession
 Performance and offering of Revolut- This means that services of Revolut in some
aspects is not as good as its competitors like offering interest on initial deposit, and
unlimited ATM withdrawals
Corporate social responsibility by Revolut
Corporate social responsibility is a self-regulatory business model with help of businesses
can fulfil their social accountability. This social accountability of organisations involve
organisation itself, stakeholders of the company, and the public (Advantage, 2020). In its
organisations, it ensures that it has a inclusive work environment which involves diversified
workforce.

Figure 1 Corporate Social Responsibility
Revolut considers different aspects of wellbeing of employees and involves women
empowerment, wellbeing of employees, pride of employees, and also provide a workplace for
parents (Freeman and Dmytriyev, 2017). This is one way in which Revolut is fulfilling its
corporate social responsibility by ensuring wellbeing of its internal stakeholders. However as
responsibilities of company concerned with social responsibility extends beyond shareholders
and organisation and consider duties towards betterment of society and natural environment.
Revolut has no very specific activities that are part of social responsibility but Revolut contribute
for society and different aspects of environment by means of promoting donation and charity
through its services and application.
Other than this, Revolut also contribute in different causes through charity and encourage
donations for different causes. Charities and causes that are supported by Revolut involve British
Red Cross, this is a international organisation for humanitarian aids (Farrington and et.al., 2017).
Save the children is another cause and organisation that is supported by Revolut, this is aimed at
improving lives of children through better education, health care, and economic opportunities.
Along with this it also provide emergency aid in natural disasters, wars and other conflicts.
WWF is another cause and organisation supported by World Wide Fund for Nature is an NGO

that works for field of wilderness preservation and reduction of human impact on the
environment.
Cancer research is also supported by Revolut this is a cancer research and awareness charity in
UK. ILGA is another cause supported by Revolut through donation in this it supports
International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association.
This discussion outlines suggests that through donation Revoult supports and contribute
in different social causes and organisations in different areas of social responsibility (Maqbool
and Zameer, 2018). CSR of Revolut also ensures that customers are given best possible services
and also ensures adherence to different regulations. It is important to consider that CSR activities
are not limited to certain aspects and organisation along with external stakeholders become
equally responsible for internal stakeholders. And it is primary duty of organisations that they
ensure effective working condition and benefits for employees.
Innovation and creativity in Revolut
Innovation is concerned with identifying and developing new solutions for problems that
are better and more feasible than existing solutions. Innovation within organisation has become
important for several reasons and one of the most important reasons for this is customer
satisfaction and sustainable growth of the company (Olsson and et.al., 2019). Innovation also is
basis for entrepreneurial organisations and start-ups.
Figure 2 Innovation

Revoult is a start-up organisation and this is why it is mainly based on element of innovation
(Hon and Lui, 2016). There are several services that are provided by Revolut and they are
innovative services including currency exchange and sending money in other countries other
than this, it also provide services for cryptocurrency and its exchange. Innovation is basis for all
these and several other services of Revolut. However, success of Revolut is not only limited to
these company also is innovating constantly.
Figure 3 Innovation and services of Revoult
Figure 4 Innovation and services ofg Revoult

In order to ensure innovation Revolut involve qualified and competent people from several
backgrounds and geographies so that they can contribute in innovation of the company and its
services to ensure its overall and sustainable success and performance. Innovation is also one of
the reason that Revolut was Deloitte’s fastest growing fintech company in 2019 (Martins,
Martins and Pereira, 2017). In order to ensure that they get creative and innovative ideas from
their employees’ leadership and management of Revolut is participative. Participative
management and leadership ensures that employees are able to say and share what they think can
add value in company and also in performance of employees as well (Megaw and Crow, 2020).
Innovation and creativity is also one of the reason that Revolut started from a fintech company
now offers several types of services. These services involve managing accounts of customers
with their spending insights, budgeting tools and open banking. Along with this services of
Revolut that creativity and innovation has made possible also involve sending money abroad
with real exchange rate and enjoying discounts at popular retailers (Gabor and Brooks, 2017).
Business account holders can also issue smart company card and this enable them to track
employees in real-time. Innovation is important for competitive advantage and sustainability of
organisations and because Revolut is a start-up it is very important to offer innovative services to
customers.
CONCLUSION
On the basis of above discussion it can be concluded that in a short span of time Revolut
has managed to succeed in its industry and became one of the best and most successful Fintech
company. This can also be identified and understood through which company has managed to
succeed. However, there are certain weaknesses of Revolut that can contribute in failure and
slowdown growth of Revolut. This means that there are certain important elements of services
that are provided by competitors of the company but are not provided by Revolut. However,
concerned with corporate social responsibility, Revolut is fulfilling its responsibility towards its
customers and employees and in some way it is also contributing in other causes of social
responsibility. Company also have effective policies through which it has managed to create
several innovative services and products for its customers.

RECOMMENDATION
Here, it can be recommended that company should involve Financial Services
Compensation Scheme because such elements help customers and trusting services that are
different from traditional financial and banking services. Because Revolut is a new approach of
banking it create difficulty for people to trust Revolut and this is why such elements and schemes
are important.
Revolut should also expand its operations because it has potential and strength for that
and can become successful through innovative and creative services that it provides to
customers. This means that Revolut can consider more global markets for its expansion and also
emerging economies, as they are providing several opportunities to new organisations.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Advantage, C., 2020. Corporate Social Responsibility. CSR and Socially Responsible Investing
Strategies in Transitioning and Emerging Economies. p.65.
Browne, R., 2018. FinTech start-up Revolut grabs 2 million users and plans to launch
commission-free trading service. CNBC, retrieved from: https://www. cnbc.
com/2018/06/07/revolut-has-2-million-users-to-launch-commission-freetrading-
service. html (June 2018).
Farrington, T and et.al., 2017. Corporate social responsibility: reviewed, rated,
revised. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management.
Freeman, R.E. and Dmytriyev, S., 2017. Corporate social responsibility and stakeholder theory:
Learning from each other. Symphonya. Emerging Issues in Management. (1). pp.7-15.
Gabor, D. and Brooks, S., 2017. The digital revolution in financial inclusion: international
development in the fintech era. New Political Economy. 22(4). pp.423-436.
Hon, A.H. and Lui, S.S., 2016. Employee creativity and innovation in
organizations. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management.
Maqbool, S. and Zameer, M.N., 2018. Corporate social responsibility and financial performance:
An empirical analysis of Indian banks. Future Business Journal. 4(1). pp.84-93.
Martins, A., Martins, I. and Pereira, O., 2017. Embracing innovation and creativity through the
capacity of unlearning. In Handbook of Research on Human Resources Strategies for
the New Millennial Workforce (pp. 128-147). IGI Global.
Megaw, N. and Crow, D., 2020. Revolut is the most hyped fintech in Europe. Can it grow
up. Financial Times Magazine, https://www. ft. com/content/7fa2a8ea-8e66-11ea-
a8ec-961a33ba80aa, accessed on 10th August.
Olsson, A and et.al., 2019. Organizational climate for innovation and creativity–a study in
Swedish retail organizations. The International Review of Retail, Distribution and
Consumer Research. 29(3). pp.243-261.
Phadermrod, B., Crowder, R.M. and Wills, G.B., 2019. Importance-performance analysis based
SWOT analysis. International Journal of Information Management. 44. pp.194-203.
Vlados, C., 2019. On a correlative and evolutionary SWOT analysis. Journal of Strategy and
Management.