Payment & Innovation Forum 2020

Vice President of European Government Affairs at American Express

Since June 2017 Elie Beyrouthy leads the company’s engagement with European Union Institutions and advises senior leaders on EU regulatory and public policy matters. Elie also represents American Express’ interests in several EU trade bodies and professional associations. Prior to joining American Express, Elie was Director of International Regulatory Affairs at Western Union for 5 years. From 2007 to 2012, Elie held leadership positions at the World Savings Banks Institute and the European Banking Federation. Elie began his career as an intern at the European Commission and the United States Federal District Court of Minnesota. He holds two Masters Degrees in Law from the University of Minnesota and from the Jean Moulin University in Lyon – France. Elie also holds a diploma from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Lyon – France

Head of the Payment and Securities Clearing and Settlement Division & Recruitment

Matthias Schmudde is Head of the Payment and Securities Clearing and Settlement Division at the Deutsche Bundesbank in Frankfurt. He is a member of the MIPC (Market Infrastructure and Payments Committee) and responsible for cashless payment and securities clearing strategy, policy issues and oversight. Matthias Schmudde is in particular involved in Eurosystem related initiatives such as Instant Payments and the Vision 2020 for market infrastructures. Previously he focused on developing and improving the Bundesbank`s own payment and accounting systems. Before joining the Bundesbank in 1997, Matthias Schmudde obtained a master’s degree in business administration and completed an apprenticeship in banking.

Head of Strategic Product Sales (Merchant acquiring – POS) / Senior Manager

László KISS is the Head of Strategic Product Sales (Merchant acquiring – POS) / Senior Manager and works for OTP Bank Plc since 2016. Primary focus on Merchant Acquisition related to Bank Card Acceptance. Previously, he worked in the Hungarian banking sector in different Controlling and Sales leader positions (at UniCredit, Raiffeisen and AXA Bank where he worked in AXA Belgium, as well). Currently, he participates an International double-degree Executive MBA program managed by SEED and the Maastricht School of Management (Netherland).

Besides, he has been very active in the area of merchant acquiring in Hungary and the Group countries since 2018. “Our strategy has been changed. We are digitalizing and thinking about cross borders, create our future and search for new & dynamic solutions. Our powerful & influential team works day over day to fit for expectations of our existing and new clients, to support their strategy and as Business Partner to help to reach their business goals. We believe that we are the ONE.”

His current focus is on selling established payment innovations from Global World to the CEE region, along with his ongoing tasks of improving and strengthening the market position and strategy of OTP customers in Hungary and out of Hungary, as well.

Policy Expert, Conduct, Payments and Consumers

Antonio has been working for the EBA for 3 years on payments-related topic. He has led the development of a number of PSD2 mandates, the EBA Opinions on SCA and eIDAS, the EBA PSD2 Register and the work on PSD2 Q&As. He has also been actively involved in the EBA API WG. Before joining the EBA, Antonio was a head of unit at the Bulgarian National Bank and responsible for authorisation and supervision of PSPs. Antonio was also a senior expert in a project for transposition of PSD2 and EMD in the Macedonian legislation. He also used to teach Banking in a university in Bulgaria.

Chairman Cybersecurity Platform of the Austrian Government

Executive Director at the Central Bank of Lebanon – Head of Payment Systems Department

Part-Time Professor at American University of Beirut (Economics & Agribusiness), Lebanese American University & Lebanese University • Participated as a speaker in several local and international conferences organized by the IMF, World Bank, AMF, Banque De France, Union of Arab Banks, Banque Du Liban, AUB, LAU and others • Board member at MIDCLEAR Education: • Ph.D in Economics ,University of Birmingham , United Kingdom • MSc. International Money and Banking, University of Birmingham , United Kingdom • B.A Economics – American University of Beirut • B.A Law (License Droit) – Lebanese University

Digital business transformation, smart optimization via AI and blockchain, development fintech projects

Implementation of fintech projects
– Off-chain transaction PoC
– Support bot for Call Center
– VR-morgage

– Managed project for improving labor productivity and reducing cost in 240 branches in cooperation with McKinsey&Company
– Implemented new POS positions: meter-greeter and client manager
– Implemented virtual queuing in regional branches
– Development of brach-rate sales system
– Development of bank quality management system, fully implemented by main board
– Analysis of bank products. Analysis and modelling of business processes
– Creation and implementation of customer service appraisal system for 450 branches
– Creation and reconciliation of bank’s corporate regulatory documents and orders
– Budget-holder. Cost planning and control. Actual vs. plan comparisons
– Setting of KPI for regional branch executives. Training methodologies
– Organisation of insurance company UralSib presentations for customers and partners
– Expert articles in professional magazines. Participation in symposiums and seminars
– Creation of reports and papers for main board
– Software design of mortgage insurance calculator
– Design of group healthcare insurance product for children
– Market research and analysis. Oversaw customer satisfaction and quality measurement project. Project administration
– Collaboration with another Head Office departments and regional branches

Director of Digital Strategy and Payments at Banco Azteca in Mexico

Romina Guevara is Director of Digital Strategy and Payments at Banco Azteca in Mexico City since October 2017 where she leads the company´s efforts to reduce the use of cash in Mexico and enable a larger percentage of the population who do not have a bank account but a mobile phone to gain access to banking services through digital solutions and emerging payment methods. Romina also represents Banco Azteca in the working group of the Association of Mexican Banks on facilitating the digital dispersion or digital delivery of social and economic support instrumented by the Mexican government; such as scholarships for young people or pensions for the elderly. Prior to joining Banco Azteca, she was Vice President of Digital Adoption and Business Development at Citibanamex for more than 3 years. Romina began her career at GE Money and has held leadership positions at other important organizations such as American Express.
She holds a Master Degree in Business Administration from Thunderbird School of Global Management in Arizona, a diploma from Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education in Mexico City and she is pursuing a post grad in general management at Ipade Business School.
Over the past years, she has been involved with matters relating to innovation, digital payments, digital adoption, and digital transformation.

Head of Division for E-money and Payment institution supervision

Rūta Merkevičiūtė is a Head of Division for E-money and Payment institution supervision at Bank of Lithuania, responsible for supervising over 100 E-money and Payment institutions. She is also a member of Lithuanian’s Payment council group, which is dedicated to investigating to further implementation of Open Banking in Lithuania.

She has professional legal qualification as an attorney-at law and for the past 10 years has been working both in private sector and financial sector’s supervision in the areas of responsibility that include AML, payments, open-banking, lending, crowdfunding, investment services and transposition of EU Directives such as PAD, PSD2 and AMLD4.

Previously, she took part in developing a regulatory framework for FinTech industry in Lithuania as a member of the interinstitutional working group for the Action Plan on FinTech industry. She also managed “Newcomer programme” and led Regulatory Sandbox in Bank of Lithuania allowing entities to test financial innovations in a live environment under the guidance and supervision of the Bank of Lithuania.

Head Innovation and Digital Banking

I am a digital transformation expert, turnaround and partnership strategist. As a Chartered Banker I come with a wealth of executive leadership and strong negotiation skills at the highest level of large corporate organizations. I have worked with Insurance, Telcos and government in East and Southern African through banks such as Standard Chartered Bank, BancABC part of London listed Atlas Mara.

Joint Director at The Central Bank of Bangladesh, Innovation & Transformational Speaker | Founder, Nazrul’s Intuition

I joined in Bangladesh Bank in 2003. I worked over 15 years on Risk-Based Inspection & Risk Management of Non-Bank FIs, ICAAP evaluation, Training & Supervision, and Banking policy.

I just completed a year professional Masters in Banking and Finance from AIT, Bangkok in 2014-2015, Besides, I participated different national & international training and visited the country: Germany, Nederlands, Belzium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, France, Turkey, Pakistan, Thailand etc.

As I have been working in Banking Policy and studying the course of Certified Expert in Risk Management from Frankfurt School of Finance and Management, my focus is to work on policy Innovation and to find out how policy can lead to innovation in the banking sector and can contribute in the growth of the country.

High motivational power, Value addition and developing capacity are my strengths which help me to believe, change, and make a success!

Research Assistant

Jonas Gross is a research assistant at the University of Bayreuth, Germany, and a project manager at the Frankfurt School Blockchain Center (FSBC).

His main research focus are central bank digital currencies, stablecoins, and cryptocurrencies. Mr. Gross wrote various publications about the Facebook-initiated cryptocurrency project “Libra” and about CBDC. As one example, Mr. Gross was co-author of the Central Bank Digital Currency Policy-Maker Toolkit published by the World Economic Forum (WEF). Mr. Gross published various articles in German magazines, like the Manager Magazin, Capital, and the Börsenzeitung.

Head of the Payments Policy Unit

In his current position, Rui Pimentel heads a team mainly involved in the analysis of developments in retail payment systems, contributing for Banco de Portugal’s mission in this domain.
Rui joined Banco de Portugal in 1997 and over the last few years he’s been significantly involved PSD2-related policy topics focusing on innovation and security issues in the field of retail payments, since the implementation of SEPA.
In this context, Rui takes part in several national and international working groups dealing with retail payments, as well as in cooperation and development projects over the years with involvement in either regulatory and in catalyst/policymaker-oriented activities.
As a result of these functions, Rui regularly intervenes in conferences and seminars on related topics.

Chief of Digital Innovation & Client Experience

Specialist in communication, Jessica is in charge of leading the customer-centric and digital mindset at MoraBanc. She is part of the team in charge of MoraBanc Digital, a multi-awarded digital banking project where client experience is the main innovation driver.  During her 8 years working on banking services, she has been dedicated to find effective ways to drive change through content creation in order to meet client’s needs and expectations

Head of Ecosystem Engagement

Simon Lyons is Head of Ecosystem Engagement for the Open Banking Implementation Entity. He leads industry and participant engagement to grow the Open Banking Ecosystem. This is achieved by engaging with existing and potential participants, also by working with industry to resolve issues, highlight benefits and raise their awareness of Open Banking. A twenty five year career in corporate banking has culminated in joining Open Banking and leading the Ecosystem growth.

Managing Partner | CORE SE

Fabian Meyer is Managing Partner in Zurich and Member of the Board of CORE SE in Berlin – an international technology ThinkTank.

Within CORE he is responsible for COREconsulting as well as for CORE ventures. There he manages projects to implement complex technology-based projects in the financial sector. A special focus of his work lays on mergers & acquisitions, payments as well as transaction banking. He completed his studies in the United States, South Korea and Japan with a master’s degree in Mannheim, and gained experience as a founder prior to that