How China Agricultural Bank Achieved Top‑Tier Continuous Testing Certification in DevOps

As DevOps integration becomes widespread across industries, testing is a critical step for improving R&D operational quality. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology’s 14th‑Five‑Year plan emphasizes enhancing software quality management, monitoring, early warning, and evaluation, calling for a complete testing certification system.

On December 15, 2023, the GOLF+IT New Governance Leadership Forum in Beijing announced the latest batch of DevOps and AIOps standard assessment results. China Agricultural Bank (ABC) participated with two projects – the Intelligent Bad‑Asset Disposal Platform Phase 4 and the Online‑Offline Integrated Tag Service Phase 2 – and both passed the Continuous Testing (CT) Level 3 assessment, marking the bank as the first state‑owned bank to achieve this level.

ABC’s R&D Center, with over 6,000 engineers across eight locations, supports a wide range of financial services for more than 800 million customers. The bank has completed 28 DevOps standard assessments, including 12 continuous delivery, 9 DevSecOps, 2 technical operations, 2 agile management, 1 application design, and 2 continuous testing evaluations.

Q&A

Q: Please introduce yourself, your company, and the projects you evaluated.

A (Cai Shizhi, Deputy General Manager, R&D Center): ABC’s R&D Center drives the bank’s digital transformation, providing reliable transaction support across retail, corporate, investment, fund, leasing, asset management, and insurance services. The Intelligent Bad‑Asset Disposal Platform digitizes credit management and asset handling, while the Integrated Tag Service aggregates customer tag data for multi‑channel delivery.

Q: How does achieving the Level‑3 Continuous Testing assessment feel?

A: We are honored to be among the first banks to pass Level 3, grateful for the support from the CAICT and the evaluators. The assessment validates our testing capabilities and strengthens confidence in advancing our testing ecosystem.

Q: Why is a continuous testing system across the software lifecycle important for enterprises?

A: Continuous testing creates an end‑to‑end loop from requirements to operations, shifting testing left to early stages and right to production, demanding robust testing skills, governance, and metrics that improve overall software quality.

Q: What changes and benefits has the assessment brought to your team?

A: The assessment provided a clear benchmark, helped identify maturity gaps, and offered actionable guidance, leading to improved automation coverage, data lifecycle management, and a stronger testing culture.

Q: Can you share successful practices for implementing continuous testing internally?

A (Cai Shizhi): Since 2018, we integrated testing with development and operations, leveraging both external standards (DevOps, TMMi) and internal initiatives to enhance processes, tools, and metrics, while promoting version verification before production to reduce defects.

Q: What motivated ABC to participate in this assessment?

A (Wang Zhenfeng, GM, Project Management Office): We aimed to validate our quality management model, adopt industry best practices, and ensure our testing capabilities remain at the forefront of the banking sector.

Q: How did the assessment improve your projects and deliver business value?

A: It enhanced requirement‑stage test participation, refined design‑stage testing strategies, and established continuous feedback mechanisms, boosting automation, data management, and overall delivery efficiency.

Q: What challenges did you face during the assessment and how were they solved?

A (Wang Zhenfeng): Challenges included tight timelines, cross‑functional collaboration, metric system development, and aligning standards with banking specifics. We addressed them through iterative planning, strong teamwork, and close dialogue with experts.

Q: What are your future plans for continuous testing?

A: We will deepen quality assurance, pursue higher maturity levels, and share best practices to continuously elevate our R&D capabilities.

Q: How do you see testing technology evolving?

A: Testing will become more intelligent and automated, with AI‑driven tools, increased security testing, and tighter integration with DevOps pipelines, requiring broader skill sets for test engineers.

Industry statistics show that state‑owned banks have collectively completed numerous DevOps assessments, with ABC leading in continuous testing maturity.

The DevOps Capability Maturity Model, jointly developed by CAICT, cloud computing alliances, and major internet firms, is the most comprehensive standard for R&D operations, recognized internationally by ITU‑T.