Searching for Mana with Lloyd Wahed

My guest this week is CEO of the leading business banking challenger for cryptocurrency and blockchain companies - BCB Group.Oliver von Landsberg-Sadie has been in the finance and technology markets for over 20 years and we cover so much in this podcast. A self-professed 'Geek', after achieving academic excellence and securing an MBA from Cass Business School, Oliver found himself in the thick of it at Lehman Brothers during the financial crisis. After spending over 10 years at Barclays and then some time at Lloyds, he went into consulting before founding BCB Group, which is now the first - and only - crypto-focused business to secure a license from the Authorised Payment Institution.We cover some fascinating subjects such as the inefficiencies of our financial system, AI and understanding consciousness, cultural diversity, and the differences between the other Directors (The Lawyer, The Hustler and The Growth Hacker). We even discuss his friendship with Hans Zimmer, as well as his own music compositions (listen to his composition, 'Double Agent,' in the podcast).If you enjoy this episode then please leave a rating and subscribe to have the latest podcasts ready for you to listen to every week.

In Episode 9 of Searching For Mana, I had the pleasure of welcoming Keith Grose to the podcast, Head of UK for Plaid.After expanding into the UK and Europe last year, Plaid has excelled, recently being named “Best Enabler” in the 11:FS 2020 Pulse Awards. With their acquisition by Visa underway, this is set to be a massive year for the fintech giant.Keith is from a small town in North Carolina, but now very much an adopted east Londoner. He has a passion for books and creative writing and when he's not performing the all-encompassing role of Head of UK for Plaid, you might find him playing football (or soccer). We talk about his early career before he found his way to Google, where he experienced the incredible innovation and energy in Silicon Valley, as well as the hard work and opportunity involved in Keith's move to London with Plaid.

In Episode 8 of Searching for Mana, I was delighted to be joined by Shefali Roy, COO & CCO at TrueLayer.Shefali was a brilliant guest. She had energy, she was open and she also gave some great insight into the innovation behind TrueLayer's success so far. We talk about so much! She started her journey in Bombay before moving to Australia, achieving academic excellence from an early age as she went. She joined the cut-throat world of Goldman Sachs, left to develop her career before being one of the first few people at Stripe in the UK. Now she's at TrueLayer with a vision for it be the best business in the sector owned by two of the nicest owners in the sector! She talks about the impact of having a strong Diversity & Inclusion policy from the outset, and one of TrueLayer's guiding principles - 'Enjoy Life.'It was a fascinating conversation and hopefully we'll have a chance to do it again after TrueLayer's next growth phase!

On Episode 7 of Searching for Mana, I had the chance to sit down with Julian Sawyer.Quite simply, Julian is an expert in the current FinTech market. He co-founded Starling Bank and led it through a period of incredible growth, advises the board of Australia's first neobank, Volt, and is currently MD of Europe for Gemini, the world's first licensed crypto-currency exchange platform, founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss.We have a great conversation about his journey through his career and life to date, experiencing firsthand the change in FinTech, his thoughts on where it's headed, as well as his love for Peloton!

On Searching for Mana this week I was delighted to be joined by Ray Brash, CEO at PPS.In the podcast we cover everything from Ray's 15 incredibly successful years at award-winning PPS - including a recent partnership with Visa; his insight into the future of FinTech; and all the bits in between his career that make him such an engaging and fun personality, like being the base player in his own band! (check out one of his songs here: https://spoti.fi/3bxeKAs) I loved having Ray on the podcast and you'll definitely enjoy listening to him.Don't forget to leave us a rating/comment if you can!

For episode 11 of Searching For Mana, I was delighted to welcome Richard Wagner, CEO of Cashplus.Cashplus are a leading UK challenger to banks and Richard has been the driving force behind it's growth over the last 16 years. We talk about his journey to the UK (he's from across the pond), the dreams and vision he had from the start, his incredulity at how long it took him to set up a bank account when he arrived in the UK, to his passion for giving people access to efficient and easy alternatives to traditional banking.Cahsplus have driven a lot of the innovation we see in the UK payments market today and are one of the most awarded digital banks in the industry. From holding the government to account to make the banking sector more competitive to looking ahead and staying at the forefront of the payment industry, Richard's story and insights are not something you want to miss

Episode 5 is a juicy one as I was joined in conversation with Sasha Yanshin, Founder and MD at Strategy Desk.Sasha has helped industry leading businesses build and grow successful products by developing astute commercial strategies, combined with digital innovation. Companies like MasterCard, Tesco, Barclays, HSBC, RBS, and Bank of America. Now he's helping banks innovate and grow by creating transformative products for their customers.We have a fantastic conversation where we discuss his journey to doing 'marketing on steroids', his vision for the future, as well as his frank and insightful analysis of what's happening in the FinTech space right now. You don't want to miss this.

I'm really excited to share the next podcast with you all, as I was joined by David Keene, Chief Marketing Officer at Funding Options.David had been a key figure in businesses like Google, Oracle, Salesforce, and SAP before joining Funding Options. We have a really open and insightful conversation around David's journey (some of the challenges and successes of his career); how his new(ish) role in a growing series A FinTech is evolving; and what he expects to see happening in the FinTech sector's near future.Enjoy listening and as always, please give it a rating once you've finished up.

Fresh off the press - Dora Ziambra comes on to Searching for Mana to announce her promotion to Chief Operating Officer at Azimo!For anyone considering the merits of taking an MBA, this episode is for you. With a background in Co-Founding and trading high-frequency algorithmic equity/index products, Dora took the long view in 2013 to attend INSEAD MBA course. This is where Dora met the future to be founders of Azimo, Michael Kent and Ricky Knox and the rest is History....Azimo founded 2012$66M funding to date and now operating in profit is an online international money transfer company that challenges the old fashioned, expensive ways of moving your money around the world. They are all about lower costs, excellent exchange rates and a brilliant service.Azimo is created with the explicit mission of cutting the costs of sending money home. Its international money transfer platform allows to send money either to a bank account or to over 270,000 cash pick-up points around the world and is accessible via mobile devices.

The Head of Banks at Flux, Roisin Levine, comes on to discuss her journey since she graduated in History at the University of Bristol several years ago.Since then, Roisin has been awarded:- 'Rising Star' in the Women in Fintech Powerlist 2018 by Innovate Finance.- Nominated for 2019's Transformation of the Year award by Women in Credit.Flux are aiming to kill the paper receipt and automatically send them to customer's phones! They're through series A and have partnerships with the likes of Barclays, Starling & Monzo. Flux and Roisin are at such an interesting phase in their journeys, it's great to catch the story at this point, where a new global standard in receipt management could be around the corner, not to mention how great for the environment this will be!