Interviews


Q&A with Walt Granville, Cachet Financial Solutions

No more “one and done.” That’s central to Cachet Financial Solutions’ mission for its prepaid clients and was the impetus for platform upgrades that were nearly a year in the making. Paybefore spoke with Walt Granville, senior vice president of mobile innovation, about what’s resonating with clients and how Cachet is using optimized mobile apps to help them fight churn.

Interview: Kyle Ferguson, Fraedom’s CEO – on the road to Fraedom

Payments technology and expense management specialist Fraedom is on the journey to tap into the $110 trillion B2B market opportunity that remains untapped today. “If the technology is both powerful and intuitive, people will use it,” states Kyle Ferguson, Fraedom’s CEO.

Interview: Martin Coen, CEO of Dovetail

Payments software vendor Dovetail is one of the very few independent fintech beacons in the industry, having not fallen into the hands of a large tech conglomerate. The company pioneered the concept of a “payment services hub” – before analysts coined the term – and has maintained double digit growth over the last decade. So what’s next? Banking Technology talks to Martin Coen, Dovetail’s CEO.

Interview: Rivi Varghese, CEO of CustomerXPs Software

Banking is going digital and instantaneous, which is great news for customers. But it is also a great headache for banks, as fraud is going that way too – the money can disappear into fraudsters’ virtual pockets with a blink of an eye, anytime, anywhere. At the same time, the real-time capabilities of new solutions […]

Interview: Rupert Scofield, founder of Finca International

Rupert Scofield, president and CEO of microfinance organisation Finca International, discusses how it brings banking to the developing world and why people should follow America’s lead in the art of philanthropy. “This is your world. My generation had its shot. We thought our problems were daunting but it’s nothing like the stuff you’re dealing with. […]

Q&A with Ron Hynes, UniRush LLC

Ron Hynes has been on the job as the new CEO of UniRush LLC less than a month, but he’s already looking ahead. And, he’s not going to let the CFPB’s looming final prepaid rulemaking slow the company down when it comes to innovation and product development. Hynes spoke with Paybefore about what he brings to his new role and why UniRush’s cardholder settlement made him want the CEO job even more.

Interview: Matteo Cassina, Saxo Bank

During the two-day MoneyConf event in Madrid, there was an exclusive Banking Technology interview with Matteo Cassina, member of the global executive committee at Saxo Bank. Deputy editor Antony Peyton spoke to him about his opinions on the show and the industry. In terms of MoneyConf 2016, Cassina says: “I do believe there are a […]

Interview: Ramin Niroumand, co-founder of FinLeap

Berlin-based fintech incubator FinLeap and solarisBank have created the first global banking platform, called Solaris – a Banking-as-a-Platform (BaaP) service. What is it all about and how is it going to make its mark on the fintech industry? Devie Mohan interviews FinLeap’s co-founder, Ramin Niroumand. The solarisBank launch has been in the press quite a […]

Q&A with Steve Montross, CPI Card Group

For card manufacturers like CPI Card Group, the U.S. transition to EMV continues to be a top priority. But broader trends like the rise of e-commerce and wearables also are shaping a business that goes well beyond plastic.

Word from the Streit: Green Dot CEO Talks to Paybefore

In the midst of a contentious proxy fight leading up to the May 23 shareholders’ meeting, Green Dot Chairman and CEO Steve Streit spoke with Paybefore about Harvest Capital’s concerns, how he sees Green Dot’s position in the market and when he’d show himself the door.

Preparing for PSD II

The European Commission’s upcoming PSD II legislation will bring big changes to the payments landscape in Europe. Banking Technology talks to Jerry Norton, VP of financial services at CGI, to find out more. In October, the European Parliament gave its approval to the level one text of the Payment Services Directive II, which aims to further the […]

Q&A with Emily Baum, Prepaid International Forum

The Prepaid International Forum (PIF) is celebrating its 10-year anniversary in 2016. Emily Baum, a non-executive board member of the forum and business development director of PrePay Solutions, tells Paybefore more about PIF, where the 23-member group is headed and how the industry is responding to calls for increased prepaid regulation following the Paris terrorist attacks.

Memory muscle

An in-memory DBMS with its roots in embedded systems for the defence and aerospace sectors is setting records for manipulating financial data. Chief executive Steve Graves told Banking Technology how it works.

Executive Profile: One on One with Joby Orlowsky, Discover Network

Joby Orlowsky is a die-hard Cubs fan—is there any other kind?—but the Chicago native’s optimism extends well beyond baseball. After nearly 20 years at Discover, Orlowsky is animated when he talks about the future of payments and Discover’s place in it. And unlike some, he’s not spooked about a potential fintech bubble.

Getting to grips with mobile security

The sensors built into mobile devices offer a whole new way of identifying their users though biometric techniques, according to security expert Uri Rivner. 

Top Payments Lawyer Spotlight: Amy Ross Lauck, Lindquist & Vennum LLP

Earlier this year, we recognized the Top 10 Payments Lawyers as voted for by Paybefore.com visitors. In our first profile, we feature Amy Ross Lauck, partner, in the payment systems and consumer financial services practice at Lindquist & Vennum LLP, who discusses the challenges of the CARD Act, prospects for the CFPB’s prepaid rulemaking and innovations yet to come.

The non-bank bank?  

Saxo Payments isn’t a bank, and the chief executive isn’t a banker. So how does he think he’s that’s going to help shake up international payments?

 

The new face of risk management

Regulations aimed at transparency across financial markets may be making things simpler for the regulators, but they are making life more complex for banks, according to Sven Ludwig, senior vice president, risk management and analytics EMEA, at SunGard.

Q&A with Brad Fauss, NBPCA

The NBPCA’s newly elected president and CEO spoke with Paybefore about priorities, what happens behind the scenes of the association, and the work that lies ahead for an industry that must continue to raise awareness on the Hill.

Nurturing innovation

Recently appointed president of investment and advisory firm Anthemis Amy Nauiokas talks about her plans to reinvent the world of financial services.

Bringing it all together

From the early days of internet distribution, New York-based Alacra has been aggregating reference data. Chief executive Steve Goldstein told David Bannister the company’s story

Taking care of business

With a string of client projects in flight, the immediate effects of the financial crisis weren’t a problem for Dublin-based Information Mosaic, but as projects that had run for two or more years started coming to an end, things got a little tougher. Fortunately, the company has one major shareholder that has both funds and a long-term view …

Brett King preaches the “good news” of mobile banking

Banks need to stop trying to exploit customers and start actually helping people, according to Brett King, chief executive at Moven. Instead of getting people to max out their credit card, a progressive bank should use smartphones and Big Data to help the consumer with the little things.

Starting over: Lloyds Banking Group’s transaction banking ambitions

While a great deal of attention has been given to Lloyds Banking Group’s retail operations as its various elements are split up, less has been given to its activities in transaction banking, where it is “one year into a three-year journey” to transform itself and its customer offerings to create“the best global transaction bank in this region”.

How to build a better SunGard

As SunGard’s first ever chief technology officer, Steven Silberstein knows a thing or two about financial technology. In a past life, he was global head of prime brokerage at Lehman Brothers. He later became chief information officer at Chi-X Global, before joining SunGard in a newly-created position two years ago.

Q&A with Ben Kaplan, CashStar

More than six months into his new gig, CashStar’s CEO explains why the biggest potential for digital gift cards may lie in promotions, loyalty and customer service.

The man from CHAPS

The UK’s Clearing House Automated Payments System turned 30 earlier this year. It wasn’t an anniversary marked with street parties by a grateful nation, but in its quiet way it was a significant moment, for – in common with the whole payments infrastructure – the system is going through a period of change. Phil Kenworthy, […]

Raincoats, taxis and the future of banking

What do taxis, the weather, mobile wallets and raincoats have in common? They are all potential variables in determining a person’s daily spend – and they provide a great opportunity for banks to use data to save customers money, according to Aman Narain, global head of digital banking Singapore at Standard Chartered.

Executive Profile: One on One with Mark Putman, First Data

As a startup veteran with five companies under his belt, Mark Putman never foresaw his future as an executive for a large company. Today, he oversees the prepaid business at First Data Corp., one of the world’s largest payments processors, as senior vice president of prepaid solutions.

Five Minutes with First Data

Paybefore chats with First Data’s Ben Love to get some insight into the company’s recent moves, as well as the future of payments.

Executive profile: One on One with Mark Schatz, Stored Value Solutions

When he can’t sleep at 2 a.m., Mark Schatz, managing director of Stored Value Solutions, will get up and run eight miles. Akin to a phoenix, running invokes renewed clarity that supports his mission in managing one of the companies that gave birth to the closed-loop gift card industry.

FIS: making a mark in mobile

Financial software giant FIS is sitting in the middle of the move to mobile, with its customers serving 21 million users. Doug Brown, senior vice president, e-banking, says that’s just the beginning.

Lessons on living in a real-time payments world

Coming to the US to tell an audience of payments specialists about how the UK has transformed its national infrastructure over the past five years with the introduction of an effectively real-time payment system might have been considered a rough assignment – what can the Brits teach the wider world, particularly the US, about payments […]

Zapp: putting banks back in the m-payments picture

Formed earlier this year, Zapp expects to launch next year with the backing of most of the major UK retail banks, Peter Keenan, chief executive of the venture, says that at the time of launch the Pay by Zapp service will be available to 40% of UK current account holders, and it will have the backing of 50% of the nation’s online and mobile retailers – including well-known brands.