Be U was inspired by Bank Islam’s passion to provide the best financial experience possible. At Aleph, we worked with them to magnify their strengths and values so as to meet their business goals.

Destined to be Malaysia’s first cloud native Islamic digital bank, Be U became a pioneer Islamic bank paving the way in transforming Malaysia’s digital banking sphere.

As we delved into understanding the ways of our target audience, we discovered that every Malaysian university student needed to open a Bank Islam account for study loans. These students proved to be a largely untapped market with massive potential for digital breakthroughs. We seized this opportunity to explore different ways to better serve this niche.

Our field research gave us the collective data to fuel our design thinking. Through collaborative workshops with Bank Islam, we defined the user personas that reflect Malaysian youth, their needs and pain points with empathy maps, user journeys, and product testing to fit their everyday life scenarios.

Our goal was to craft a memorable brand mark that would resonate with Be U’s diverse Malaysian audience. “Be U” translates to “Be yourself”, our minimalistic mantra for empowering Malaysian youth to live their lives and achieve their goals on a daily basis. People are happiest when they are their best selves. We aimed to amplify that through a dynamic, unique visual illustration style.

We knew right away that the bright, bold pink would punctuate Be U’s vivid, youthful lifestyle experience. Embracing the importance of visual representations for the younger generation, we made custom illustrations prominent all over the app in line with Be U’s youthful identity.

Inspired by the idea to empower youth to be the best version of themselves, we illustrated the logo and visual elements with an amicable, lighthearted essence, akin to the nature of Malaysian youth.

The people of today make financial transactions and manage their funds on the go, with everything in the palm of their hand. Embracing this, Be U was designed to broaden financing inclusion, revolutionizing the way Bank Islam connects with Malaysia’s growing digital-led generation.

Curated experiences for every individual is essential in technology-driven banking. Be U is set to evolve and continuously provide functional, inclusive features for everyone.

Financing can be confusing, even for grown adults, or downright frustrating. We swept all that hassle away by creating a personal assistant. Bearing a native Arabic name that reflects the growing financial intelligence of Malaysian youth, Aqil lives within the Be U app to help them navigate their daily needs with ease.

A unique addition to what would have otherwise been a regular banking app, the gig marketplace allows youths to not only manage their money better, but also consider additional and alternative streams of income. In this space, we made it possible to search for various opportunities via different partners, be it freelance projects, part-time or full-time roles and ad-hoc jobs.

To form a cohesive synergy between designers and developers, we documented our design language for collective governance. Our design system became the single source of truth, housing the brand identity, visuals, and elements in bringing Be U to life.

As the financing needs of Malaysians continue to grow, Be U and Bank Islam will evolve alongside them. Thus, expect frequent new functionalities and offerings on the Be U app in the years to come.