Building the best digital bank in Vietnam with Mambu
MSB’s digital speedboat, TNEX, was designed to serve Vietnam’s young, mobile-first Gen Z population—powered by Mambu’s cloud-native platform and now serving over 2.2 million customers as of Q2 2025.
- minutes online lending processing time
- customers onboarded 5 years post-launch
TNEX
About the customer
TNEX, established in December 2020 as a spinoff of Maritime Commercial Joint Bank (MSB), is the leading digital bank in Vietnam.
Built on a modern, cloud-native core, TNEX delivers seamless banking services and digital lifestyle features through a single mobile app. With no branches and a focus on Gen Z and micro-merchants, TNEX has been named “Best Digital Bank in Vietnam” three years in a row (2022–2024) by The Asian Banker.
TNEX goes beyond everyday banking. Its platform supports customers’ financial and personal growth—offering tools that encourage exploration, development, and creativity. By combining essential banking with lifestyle-driven services, TNEX helps foster a generation that’s digitally empowered, ambitious, and ready to act on big ideas.
The challenge
Meeting the needs of a mobile-first generation
Around 40% of Vietnam’s 101+ million population is under the age of 30. This young, mobile-first generation is highly connected and expects seamless, digital-first experiences—including in banking. But despite 128 million mobile subscriptions, traditional banks were still tied to outdated systems that couldn’t keep up.This is where Maritime Bank (MSB) saw an opportunity – and launched TNEX.
For the foundation of its end to end digital-only banking experience, TNEX needed a banking platform that could scale infinitely while operating entirely seamlessly. The team did not want to limit their scope and worry about infrastructure by purchasing a traditional core banking system or building one in-house. Instead, they wanted to devote their efforts towards solving real-life customer problems.
“Mambu’s composable platform helped us build Vietnam’s first digital only bank. It is fully scalable, allowing us to grow quickly and respond with agility to customer needs as they arise. The Mambu platform is also completely configurable, meaning we can design it to meet our specific requirements.”
- Nguyen The Minh, CEO at TNEX
The solution
A cloud-native, composable approach from day one
At the beginning of 2020, TNEX made a strategic decision to take a cloud-native approach. It evaluated potential partners based on market presence, core functionality, and pricing flexibility.
Mambu stood out for its composable architecture and best-of-ecosystem model – one that aligned closely with TNEX’s own approach to building with specialist partners rather than relying on a single vendor for everything.
By adopting Mambu’s API-first core banking platform, TNEX was able to integrate the right tools for identity verification, payments, customer engagement and more. Rolling out in phases, it launched its merchant platform in August 2020, followed by its consumer platform in November—just 10 months after kicking off development. Running on Amazon Web Services (AWS), TNEX now operates a lean, scalable stack that gives it the freedom to move fast, avoid vendor lock-in and seamlessly deliver new features.
“Mambu is a veteran in a young market and offered a robust, cloud-native solution that operates seamlessly removing all pain points.”
- Nguyen The Minh, CEO at TNEX
The result
Becoming the best digital bank in Vietnam
TNEX has grown from concept to market leader in under five years, successfully attracting over 2.2 million customers by Q2 2025.
On top of banking, it continues to develop practical, life-enhancing features such as savings tools, consumer finance solutions, and financial support for online merchants—all while operating efficiently with no physical infrastructure.
With Mambu at its core, TNEX is set up to keep scaling and stay ahead of the curve.
Looking to build a digital-only bank?
Mambu’s cloud-native core banking platform gives you the speed, flexibility and scalability to deliver modern digital banking experiences—without the legacy drag.
