From SaaS Bloat to AI-Native: Klarna’s Tech Stack Overhaul
The fintech hyperscaler Klarna has been juggling 1,200 SaaS applications — from Salesforce, Workday, and a hundreds of other providers — only to realize this is a major impediment for the next phase of AI transformation. That was Klarna’s reality until about a year ago, when it hit the reset button.
In a revealing X thread on March 4, 2025, CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski made a confession: the company had ditched its bloated SaaS ecosystem, including high-profile exits from Salesforce and Workday, for an in-house, AI-driven stack anchored by Neo4j. BUT there was no intention to go public with it.
Actually, Klarna hasn’t ditched completely Salesforce as they are reportedly using Slack but they have replaced Workday with Deel, the unified HR platform.
Klarna`s move is an internal cleanup and at the same time a signal that fintechs drowning in a spaghetti web of SaaS need to rethink their tech stacks for an AI-first world.
The SaaS Bloat Problem: Too Many Tools, Too Little Unity
Klarna’s 1,200 SaaS apps — likely from 200–400 providers, not a full 1,200 vendors — were clearly a major impediment similar to that faced by incumbents with legacy tech. Salesforce powered customer relationships, Workday handled HR, and countless niche tools tackled payments, compliance, and more. Each solved a piece of the puzzle in the growing Klarna business, but the mess of silos became problematic as the AI transformation was a strategic necessity.
Data stayed trapped, integrations bled resources, and costs spiraled as subscriptions piled up. For a fintech spanning 45+ markets with payments, lending, and e-commerce, this fragmentation was a chokehold on efficiency.
It’s a trap that several Fintechs fall into: stacking SaaS tools to go-to-market and facing challenges as digital growth explodes. Microsoft’s Satya Nadella put it bluntly on a podcast late last year: SaaS apps are often “CRUD databases with business logic” — basic systems for creating, reading, updating, and deleting data. In an AI-driven era, that feels archaic or better said `the new spaghetti problem`.
Klarna realized this challenge: bloated SaaS wasn’t just inefficient — it was a barrier to the agility and innovation AI requires. Intelligence can’t be confined in one area of the business — for example, in customer service but not in product design.
Consolidation: Exiting Giants, Building Smarter
Klarna didn’t mess around although they didn’t intend to make a big fuss out of it. Salesforce? About a year ago, as Siemiatkowski confirmed on X, Klarna reduced its Saas usage to a bare minimum. Workday? Axed within weeks of a September 2024 announcement, per investor calls. Klarna consolidated their 1,200 Saas apps into a unified, in-house “knowledge stack” with Neo4j — a graph database that links data as nodes and relationships — which is the basis for a custom AI layer. Not every SaaS got the boot; Deel was adopted as a streamlined HR replacement. The result? I would think that the $40 million cost cut they announced included all this Saas consolidation and was not only about the customer service agent optimization.
This consolidation wasn’t about swapping vendors — it was about tidying about Klarna`s tech stack towards unification. Neo4j connects customer profiles, transactions, and operational data in ways siloed SaaS never could. This is in preparation for AI `mining. Think fraud patterns or personalized credit offers — leaving CRUD-based tools in the past.
In-House Tech Stacks: Owning the Game
Control, flexibility, unification seems to be the name of the game for grown up fintechs that intend to stay leaders in this next cycle of AI transformation. SaaS is convenient but Klarna realized it needed a unified, agile custom stack. They have chosen the Neo4j ways.
Revolut on the other hand seems to have avoided this Saas bloat, as it has built all its stack in house. or
Fintech Hyperscalers: what is their edge?
Klarna`s focus is clearly unity: one ecosystem, minimal logins, and a data lake that fuels smarter operations. Deel`s adoption by Klarna shows that its Saas consolidation will be focused on unifying Saas providers.
Optimizing for an AI-Native World
Klarna’s overhaul isn’t just about savings — it’s about AI readiness. Nadella’s vision of AI agents replacing SaaS apps is taking shape already. Klarna’s operational overhaul is about a unified stack feeding AI a goldmine of connected data. As we have emphasized in our AI-native network, intelligence is all about moving across all areas — customer, enterprise, ecosystem — and all dimensions. Going beyond the traditional siloed approach by functional areas — e.g. HR, customer services, product, finance etc.
The Fintech Wake-Up Call
Klarna stands out as one of the Fintech hyperscalers forced to clean-up house. Revolut, Nubank, and Stripe built leaner, in-house stacks from the start, sidestepping the SaaS fragmentation Klarna had to face. Other neobanks like Monzo and N26, seem to have avoided this Saas bloat that Klarna faced.
As AI agents are looming, the question becomes: `What is the optimal Saas consolidation for each Finserv business?`
The fintech SaaS market is reportedly poised to grow, with projections reaching $724+ billion by 2030.
However, there is a notable, qualitative shift with SaaS providers pivoting towards AI-driven solutions and robust data integration capabilities.
While fintech hyperscalers like Klarna are moving towards in-house, AI-native tech stacks, there’s a growing opportunity for SaaS providers to cater to small and medium-sized fintech enterprises.
[1] DEEL vs. AI: Can HR Tech’s Fastest Growing Company Lead the AI Revolution?
[2] The chapter `𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐚𝐧 𝐀𝐈-𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞` is a must-read for any professional!
Included in the Wiley book co-authored with the faculty of The The Fast Future Executive:
𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐅𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐅𝐮𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞 𝐁𝐥𝐮𝐫: 𝐃𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐈𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐒𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐅𝐮𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞
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