Case — ING Group | Digital services

Use a standardized way to execute tests and aggregate test results.

The ING Group is a Dutch multinational banking and financial services corporation headquartered in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Its primary businesses are retail banking, direct banking, commercial banking, investment banking, wholesale banking, private banking, asset management, and insurance service.

What was the problem?

Because ING Group is moving towards a Continuous Delivery/Continuous Integration (CD/CI) pipeline for all its IT systems, including Murex, the bank invested in test automation. The design and implementation of a comprehensive test automation framework, based on MxTest, was meant to reduce manual test effort, (potential) human error, and testing timelines, while providing stakeholder and management reporting and auditability of test results. The framework utilizes the software vendor’s proprietary test tooling (MxTest/Onyx) as well as custom-built Python software.

Why did ING Group ask for Varrlyn’s help?

While Murex is proprietary software, utilizing its proprietary test tooling makes the most sense. Varrlyn developed custom Python tooling to wrap the proprietary test tool, integrating it in ING Group’s Continuous Integration landscape. We also designed the Test Automation Framework concept and created most of its components. The main benefits of the test automation framework is a standardized way to execute tests, aggregate test results and report to stakeholders, and as the basis for issue analysis. This led to much improved and uniform insight in test progress and results, while also reducing test and reporting effort substantially, on both the bi-weekly release cycle testing as well as big upgrade or migration projects. ING Group is now making use of a standardized way to execute tests and aggregate test results. Also, ING Group experiences a significantly shortened lead time for test and reporting efforts, on both the bi-weekly release cycle testing and bigger upgrade or migration projects. This standardization provides a solid basis for issue analysis and resolution, reducing re-work.

How did Varrlyn work together with ING Group?

The project, which lasted 2 years, ran parallel to running change projects which were utilizing the Test Framework to an increasing extent (binary and patch upgrades, DB migration). It involved 6 people, including 2 Varrlyn team members, as PM/PO and Technical/Functional BA. Specialists from the vendor, the client and the offshore development centre were also involved.
Account manager Philip van den Emster