Idea 315 of 500. Cluster 15: Software, services and the remote desk
Software maintenance for the legacy systems that every bank in the region still runs
The mechanism, from the book
The proof exists in Malabe. What is missing is a thousand small versions of it.
Every idea in cluster 15 uses this mechanism.
A first step
Find engineers who worked on the old banking systems and are now retired or underused, and ask whether they would take contract maintenance work. Then approach the head of IT at a small bank or finance company in the region with a named team and a fixed monthly fee for keeping one legacy system running. A trial contract is the proof.
- Who pays first
- A bank's head of IT with an old system nobody wants to touch, who will pay a fixed monthly fee for people who understand it.
- What leaves today
- Engineers who know the old systems retire or emigrate, while the banks that still run them pay high rates abroad to keep them alive.
The idea and the mechanism are from the book. The first step was written for this site as a suggestion; if you know a better one, say so.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
The only test any idea on this site has to pass. The four rules that go with it are here.
In the book
- Ch. ThreeWhat We Have Already Built
The stock exchange in Malabe
More from cluster 15
- 296Remote-work hubs in Kandy, Galle and Jaffna with fibre, power and a lawyer who knows the tax
- 297A Sri Lankan software product, not a services firm: one tool, sold by subscription to the world
- 298Bookkeeping for small British and Australian firms, in their time zones: the software keeps the books, and a qualified accountant here checks them and answers the client's questions
- 299Lawyers here checking the contracts and filings that AI drafts for foreign law firms, since commercial law here follows English law, the higher courts work in English and the lawyers are here
- 300AI set up and looked after for small businesses at home and abroad: the booking replies, the invoices, the product descriptions in five languages, for a monthly fee
- 301Architecture and engineering design for firms in the Gulf and Europe: the drawings made with the new tools, and an engineer here who checks that it will stand up
Idea 315 of the 500 in the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? Every one can be started by one person, one family or one small firm.