Through extensible capabilities, community banks and credit unions can punch above their weight by connecting to modern third-party apps and features — without swapping out their core systems. Extensible systems allow FIs to integrate with third-party apps with minimal friction, enabling easier access to account data and quicker pivots, says Christian Ruppe, SVP and chief innovation officer at Fitzgerald, Georgia-based Colony Bank. It lets banks and credit unions add modern apps and features — including quicker onboarding and transaction capabilities — without changing their core systems. Yet despite these benefits, many are falling behind on adoption. According to Ryan Siebecker, a forward deployed engineer at Narmi, a banking software firm, the route to extensibility can be enabled through an internally built, custom middleware system, or institutions can work with outside vendors whose systems operate in parallel with core systems, including Narmi. Other FIs that work with vendors — including Colony Bank and Grasshopper Bank — say using outside partners with capabilities that stand on top of existing core systems allow them to maintain lean internal operations without sacrificing the quality of the integrations. Luther Liang, SVP of product at Grasshopper Bank, told that by working with a vendor, the bank didn’t have to hire additional staff to manage software integrations enabled by extensibility. Colony Bank is starting to see results two years since it began its extensibility rollout. It’s enabled three major use cases: a modern account opening solution; an app that improves call center efficiency by allowing call center reps to co-browse with customers; and a client data visualization tool. Colony’s core provider “charges us per integration, and so now we’re not having to pay per integration — we have one integration, and we pay for that,” says Ruppe. “If you do it right, you can make it make sense immediately, but the long term is where you really win.” While Colony Bank might not be looking to compete with the top megabanks, “we know our communities better than they do…we can then provide technology that is specific to those customers,” he says.