NextWave & Diffblue join forces to transform testing in finance

NextWave Consulting and Diffblue have announced a strategic collaboration to address challenges in software testing for financial institutions.

Poor testing has been highlighted as a major contributor to delays and cost overruns, impacting more than 30% of technology programmes within the financial sector. The partnership seeks to mitigate these issues by combining NextWave's expertise in financial services transformation with Diffblue's AI-driven unit test technology.

NextWave Consulting, which provides strategy and automation solutions to banks, asset managers, insurers, and private equity firms, will integrate Diffblue Cover into its services for financial clients. The consultancy has a track record of executing complex transformation projects and will now deliver test automation on a wider scale.

Chris Dutta, Partner and Testing Practice Lead at NextWave, said: "At NextWave, we are focused on delivering real business outcomes at speed. Our collaboration with Diffblue unlocks a new level of capability in software testing. With Diffblue Cover, our clients can now achieve dramatically higher test coverage and faster delivery across legacy modernisation, cloud migration, and DevOps projects."

Diffblue Cover utilises reinforcement learning to automate the writing of unit tests for Java applications, thereby enabling development teams to test at scale without extensive manual effort. The company claims that financial institutions using its technology have seen up to a 26-fold increase in test productivity compared with traditional code assistants. In some cases, test coverage on legacy systems has improved from below 20% to over 80% within a matter of days.

Toffer Winslow, Chief Executive Officer of Diffblue, said: "Partnering with NextWave allows us to reach more financial institutions looking to reduce risk, improve resilience, and deliver faster. Together, we're redefining what's possible in software delivery."

According to the organisations, this partnership is already producing results. Initial projects have reported enhancements in regression testing speed, increased coverage of legacy codebases, and reduced lead times to production in strategic testing initiatives.

Diffblue has experience supporting several Fortune 500 companies, including four of the largest US banks. Its AI-powered tools are aimed at streamlining aspects of the software development lifecycle, enabling teams to improve code quality and productivity.

The collaboration focuses on aiding financial institutions as they tackle projects related to legacy system modernisation, cloud migration, and the adoption of DevOps practices. By leveraging automation and AI, the intention is to de-risk transformation projects and improve outcomes in the sector.

Both organisations expect the partnership to set new benchmarks for efficiency and quality in software testing within the financial services industry.