Leaders In Payments

Greg Myers
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May 2, 2023 • 26min

Stephen Faust, CEO of Dash Solutions | Episode 221

My guest this week has a passion for configurability, customization and customer satisfaction. He originally started his journey in marketing, but it didn’t take long for him to pivot to finance and, more specifically, what would eventually be called fintech. He was the second employee to join his current company, next in line only to the original founder himself, and has been adding value to the prepaid technologies sector of our industry ever since. Dash Solutions CEO Stephen Faust is a true leader in his piece of the payments pie.For those of you who may not know, Dash Solutions has been in the payments industry for a very long time, branded originally as Prepaid Technologies. The re-brand itself was a recent one and also a bit of a no-brainer. According to Stephen, Dash is the name of the product brand they went to market with for many years and what they really do from a value adding perspective is provide solutions to their customers’ payments needs.They currently have four payments pillars where they provide cutting edge digital solutions: Pay, rewards, corporate disbursement, and expense management. And as for their competitive advantage, Stephen touts the fact that they are not a single solution provider. They have built their technology to be multi solutional with more than 80 approved bank issued card programs and endless customizable configurations for each one of these product offerings. In a nutshell, they don’t go in looking to sell a product. Rather, they go in looking for the solutions that the business needs and then they customize a product specifically for them.Tune in to hear Stephen talk about his journey to the role of CEO, including where he sees the industry going in the next 2 to 3 years as it relates to digital advancement and real-time offerings. We also talk about the trillions of dollars in commercial payments that have yet to transition to digital in multiple “niche” industries where payments have detrimentally lagged.
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Apr 26, 2023 • 33min

Tate Hackert, Co-founder & President of ZayZoon | Episode 220

My guest this week grew up on a small-town island in Canada but had to go all the way to Hong Kong before he finally realized that being a lawyer wasn’t his calling. When he returned, he had exchanged his passion for a “reputable career” for an obsession with technology. ZayZoon Co-founder and President Tate Hackert went from Meetups to mainstream via the tech startup path – and all on behalf of the employee/employer dynamic when it comes to payments.For those of you who may not know, ZayZoon is a way for employees to get paid prior to their individually scheduled paycheck date. And for those of you wondering why this is so important, Tate will be the first to tell you that 80 million Americans live paycheck to paycheck. For this demographic, the capacity to access earned wages as needed significantly minimizes cash flow distress and the resulting predatory product scams and credit hits that can often come with it.How does it work? In a nutshell, any employee at a participating location can go in and request their pay prior to their pay date and then once their paycheck clears, the funds are re-deposited back to ZayZoon. This includes the ability to send money directly to the employee bank account, as well as prepaid debit card options with automatic check deposit and the capacity to stream wages, and gift card options that offer a “coupon clipping on steroids” kind of benefit. With this product, employees benefit from the ability to save money, while employers can more than double their candidate pipeline and employee retention.Tune in to hear Tate talk about his journey to the role of Co-founder and President, including where he sees the industry going in the next 2 to 3 years as it relates to real-time payments, interoperability, and the democratization of our payments ecosystem. We also talk about his “big hairy audacious goal” to save 10 million employees 10 billion dollars!
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Apr 19, 2023 • 33min

Johan Roets, CEO of Dragonfly Financial Technologies | Episode 219

My guest this week started working on the digital evolution before it was even recognized as evolutionary. He has a resume that is exemplary of a true leader in payments and his greatest passion (besides voraciously consuming books) is applying technology to solve business problems. Dragonfly Financial Technologies CEO Johan Roets is the self-proclaimed “other famous tech billionaire from South Africa” and this is his story! For those of you who may not know, Dragonfly Financial Technologies provides digital banking solutions to banks in the United States. They offer a technology platform for banks where their corporate and business customers can sign on and do all their corporate payments, cash management, and reconciliation in a manner that backs directly into their accounting platform. Their target market is larger regional banks looking to compete with the big players in the U.S. ecosystem.Johan sees Dragonfly as “a white knight to the banks” in that Dragonfly helps them accelerate their innovations to be able to compete with those fintechs that are dominating the market. The core benefits they offer include fintech integration, open baking, AI-based solutions for corporations, and high-value payments in real time.Tune in this week to hear Johan talk about his journey to CEO, including why he feels people still struggle to trust non-banks with their financial assets. We also talk about where he sees the industry going in the next 2 to 3 years as it relates to Blockchain and payments fraud, the bank versus the non-bank competition when it comes to owning the customer journey, open banking as a necessity in our ecosystem and just how quickly money can move in the wake of financial turmoil. 
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Apr 12, 2023 • 24min

Jamie Walker, CEO of Elavon | Episode 218

My guest this week has a passion for people, payments, and Orange Theory? Yep, you heard me right! Orange Theory enthusiast and Elavon CEO Jamie Walker is a phenomenally empathetic leader with a fascinating journey in payments and almost 1,200 Orange Theory classes under his belt since 2013! And if you ask him where he gets his business advice from, he will be the first to tell you that one of his top advisors is his wife.For those of you who may not know, Elavon is a payment processor and wholly owned subsidiary of U.S. Bank. They offer payment processing to a wide array of customers including the smallest business to the largest airline, and all on a global scale. Their primary verticals are airlines, hospitality, healthcare, retail, and (most recently) mass transit. And they support all money movement needs for their customers via their embedded finance solution, Talech.As for their competitive advantage, Jamie touts their breath of distribution, their industry specific solutions that uniquely service their customers, and the digital assets provided by their U.S. Bank relationship. And when asked what Jamie’s secret sauce is for running such a high performing team, he lives by the following: Be accountable, offer thought leadership, and do both with a sense of urgency.Tune in this week to hear Jamie talk about his journey to the role CEO, including his 22-year tenure with U.S. Bank, the catalyst that fueled his empathetic leadership style, and where he sees the industry going in the next 2 to 3 years as it relates to contactless, embedded payments, digital wallets, and a secure checkout experience.
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Apr 5, 2023 • 27min

Eric Shoykhet, Co-Founder & CEO of Link Money | Episode 217

As we move away from diversity and inclusion month and back to life as we know it, my guest this week gets us back on track as a true leader in the payment industry with a successful business targeting one of the more compelling industry buzzwords these days: open banking. But Link Money Cofounder and CEO Eric Shoykhet will be the first to tell you that open banking, as a concept in the U.S. anyways, doesn’t really exist…For those of you who may not know, Link Money is a company that provides a pay by bank solution in the United States that enables merchants to allow their customers to pay from their bank account as part of the standard check out flow. This includes everything from ecommerce and insurance to parking, storage, and remittances, with a target prerequisite of high frequency and larger volume transactions. Why? Because this is where the real benefit is realized for merchants and customers alike.Just like most everything else in the world these days, interchange rates are rising at an astronomical rate. One of the biggest benefits of using a pay by bank solution like Link Money is the ability to take your transactions off the credit rails, onto the ACH rails, and offer a more cost effective and more secure way to pay. For merchants, the benefit of using Link Money is the ability to reduce transaction costs by up to 70-80%, and even higher for some use cases. Additional benefits include less fraud and an overall reduction in payment churn.Tune in this week to hear Eric talk about his journey to CEO, including why the US tends to be so far behind in the open banking concept, and where he sees the industry going in the next few years as it relates to fewer payment methods, a narrower focus on payments strategy, and the inevitable transition in customer psychology that is already happening today.
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Mar 29, 2023 • 27min

D&I Series - Carlos Antequera, Co-Founder & CEO of Novel Capital | Episode 216

For our last episode of diversity and inclusion month, we take DEI to a place that could offer one of the most crucial necessities for a diverse and inclusive mindset: the VC space. And to discuss this segment with us, we have Novel Capital Co-Founder and CEO Carlos Antequera.For those of you who may not know, Novel Capital leverages technology and data to provide non-diluted capital to tech entrepreneurs that don’t fit traditional bank requirements or are not an ideal match for the traditional equity process. They employee a little more than 20 people and services a few hundred customers currently, with the majority of their customers being tech founders or software entrepreneurs. The company’s goal is to collect key data points from their clients and then use their algorithms and expert data teams to provide a conducive capital match within a 10-day window.When it comes to the venture capital space, Carlos will be the first to tell you that unconscious bias has the potential to run rampant with traditional VCs when it comes to funding companies. He explains that many will try to find a pattern around what has been successful in the past and stick to that same recipe for their future investments. Ingredients include things like the college the potential founder attended (was it Ivy League or not?), their degree, and even the type of business they’re looking to start. And this can obviously be a challenge for minority applicants who may not have grown up in a life of privilege and expectation.Tune in this week to hear Carlos talk about his journey to CEO, how his own challenges with DEI drove his passion to start Novel Capital and what he views as the most necessary requirement for a successful DEI initiative. We also talk about the need for DEI to start at the educational level and the outlook for diverse founders looking to secure funding during the current economic climate. 
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Mar 22, 2023 • 31min

D&I Series - Tara Wilson, COO & Chief Diversity Officer at Zum Rails | Episode 215

My guest this week is the perfect person to keep our traction going for diversity and inclusion month! She is a self-proclaimed proud and positive disruptor that lives by the motto if you know better, do better. And she has had more than 20 years of experience in the fintech space, paving the way for the much-needed disruption of gender bias along the way. Zum Rails COO and Chief Diversity Officer Tara Wilson talks to us today about how to bake DEI into your DNA.For those of you who may not know, Zum Rails offers a seamless, off-the-shelf product to combine open banking with payments, creating an easier way for businesses to manage the full maturation of the transaction. Their objective is to simplify the payment space and they see each payment as a full lifecycle that includes onboarding, settlement and even management beyond the payment reconciliation. Their target markets include mortgage companies, crypto, lending an investment, and their company currently has just under 50 people – all of which are working fully remote.As for the diversity and inclusion aspect, I talked to Tara about how to build it into the company DNA. She speaks passionately about having each company know what their NorthStar is when it comes to DEI and to strive to make that journey happen while living within the values and principles of each individual company contributor. Some of the main strategies she talks about include defining core values, establishing a mission and vision, leadership training, the importance of same-place mentality, and executing all of this from the top down through open, honest, and consistent communication.  Tune in this week to hear Tara talk about her journey to COO, including what it felt like to be one of the only women in fintech and the “lucky to be here” versus “deserve to be here” mentality that has motivated her passion for DEI. We also talk about how to make DEI a true company standard versus a tick box exercise, and why leaders need to understand ROI when it comes to employee well-being.
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Mar 15, 2023 • 27min

D&I Series - Basil Onyia, Sr. HR Specialist at Worldline | Episode 214

As we move into the second week of diversity and inclusion, this month’s theme for the Leaders in Payments podcast series, I’m excited to take the time to speak with Worldline HR specialist Basil Onyia. What makes him such a good speaker for this series? His number one passion in life is helping people become the best version of themselves – together.For those of you who may not know, Worldline is the payments provider and software of choice for ISV providers across 60 global industries. They are currently ranked #4 in our global ecosystem, with a competitive advantage rooted in sustainability. As for their key offerings, Basil says the best way to think of it is 1 platform + 1 integration + 1 billing service. And this is their equation for success.From a diversity and inclusion perspective, Worldline does an exceptional job of creating a culture that follows the IDEA philosophy on a global scale. IDEA, according to Basil, stands for Inclusion, Diversity, Equitability and Accessibility. And these are the four crucial components to ensuring a thriving culture grounded in equality.When asked about the specific initiatives they take to ensure this equitable foundation in their corporate culture, Basil speaks of three different pillars: internal, external, and global. Their internal focus includes subcultural celebration, psychological safety, and education, while their external focus relies heavily on building community relationships and a diverse talent pool with the partners they choose to do business with. From a global perspective, their third pillar, Basil speaks about Trust 2025 – an initiative to make Worldline the frontrunner for closing the gender and accessibility gap in the tech industry.Tune in this week to hear Basil talk about his journey to diversity and inclusion, what drives his passion for it, as well as the details our industry needs to be focusing on when it comes to the neurodivergent population and how to create an equitable foundation for them. Also, learn about the one thing Basil says can shift an entire society!
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Mar 8, 2023 • 26min

D&I Series - Lissele Pratt, Co-founder and COO of Capitalixe | Episode 213

It’s that time of year again! March is upon us and, as my loyal listeners know, this is Diversity and Inclusion month for the LIP podcast series. And I can’t think of a better guest to kick us off than Forbes 30 Under 30 recipient and UK Fintech Diversity and Inclusion nominee Lissele Pratt. Oh, she also holds the title of Capitalixe Cofounder and COO (in her spare time). For those of you who may not know, Capitalixe is a fintech consultancy company that specializes in helping medium-to-high-risk industries obtain payments and banking solutions. They have a global network of more than 50 banks and financial institutions that they match their high-risk clients with, based on their needs and business goals. As a general rule, this includes the underserved industries such as gaming, quick tow, CBD, and various investment platforms.A female minority in the fintech space, Lissele herself has dealt with the challenges of gender bias in such a heavily male-dominated industry. In fact, she will be the first to say that her initial experience in finance found her in a company where she was the only ethnic woman out of a group of 50 – the rest being compromised of white men. This experience in and of itself motivated her to create a company with diversity and inclusion already thriving in their foundational DNA. And this is exactly what she has achieved with Capitalixe.Some of the stats she touts are very motivating – including a 25% potential increase in financial returns for executive-level gender diversity and a 35% potential increase for executive-level racial and ethnic diversity. All this (and more) validates that diversity and inclusion are two necessary ingredients for success and scalability.Tune in this week to hear Lissele talk about the necessities around diversity and inclusion as it relates to the success of the overall company, how she wove it into the foundation of her company culture and why she believes “you only achieve true success when you’re able to help others achieve theirs too.” 
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Mar 2, 2023 • 35min

Marc Milewski, Co-founder & CEO of Zum Rails | Episode 212

My guest this week has a passion for building, a love for farming, and history with solving problems in the music industry that really fueled the foundation of his professional payments career. Zum Rails Cofounder and CEO Marc Milewski wanted nothing more than to build hydrogen cars in Iceland but found himself building payments technology in Canada. For those of you who may not know, Zum Rails is a fintech company with a mission to change payments as a whole into something they call financial interactions. According to Marc, the best way to think about them is “open banking meets instant payments.” They offer a different way of thinking about payments regarding how to forecast them into financial information, and their goal is to eliminate the hassles of all the nuances that come with payment acceptance.As for their competitive advantage, Marc himself said it best: “Our competitors think about payments as just payments. We see it as something completely different.” Their business model goes beyond shaving basis points to drive a strategy that makes their customer’s lives genuinely easier. And with one sales guy in a company of 42 employees, it’s fascinating to hear Marc talk about how the product really sells itself.Tune in this week to hear Mark talk about his journey to CEO, including how he got from almost building hydrogen cars to building payment platforms, as well as where he sees the industry going in the next 2 to 3 years as it relates to payment companies owning more of their software, the high disruption of digital currency, the thinning of the herd, and the unrelenting Asterix that always goes with moving money *instantly.*

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