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Home Awards The Top 25 Women Leaders in Financial Technology of Europe for 2022
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THE TOP 25 WOMEN LEADERS IN FINANCIAL TECHNOLOGY OF EUROPE FOR 2022

February 21, 2022
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The Financial Technology Report is pleased to announce The Top 25 Women Leaders
in Financial Technology of Europe for 2022. This year’s awardees represent some
of the most accomplished women leading organizations and teams across various
segments of the financial technology sector. As finance continues its rapid
transition into a digital experience, these executives and their companies
remain at the forefront driving towards more efficient solutions across global
payments, money management, cryptocurrency exchange, cloud banking, big data
management, and a number of other areas.

Laura Marshall built Finastra’s value engineering function from scratch and
created a dynamic department that is firmly embedded across the company as its
Chief Operating Officer, Europe. And Laura Pappi, Head of Operations at
HyperJar, created a global, hybrid, scalable team capable of working remotely—a
year before the pandemic made this business-critical. As Director of Risk and
Privacy Compliance, Priya Shah has been instrumental in shaping the platform,
product, and operational strategies of CarePay, which has enabled five million
users to acquire healthcare services digitally in Africa.

Out of scores of nominees, these women were selected for their proven ability to
lead others, their deep domain expertise, and their impact on the overall
fintech sector. They have made invaluable contributions to their companies that
have in turn been able to thrive in the competitive, rapidly advancing digital
financial space in Europe and around the world. Please join us in celebrating
the achievements of this year’s Top 25 Women Leaders in Financial Technology of
Europe for 2022.

 

1. Tara Farrer, APEXX Global
Title: Senior Vice President of Operations

Tara Farrer is the Senior Vice President of Operations at APEXX Global. APEXX is
a multi-award-winning payments orchestration platform, aggregating global
payment technologies into a single marketplace for enterprise merchants. For the
past five years, Farrer has been responsible for assembling the operational
team, implementing operating strategies, building processes and procedures from
the ground up, and making them fit for scale. Under her auspices, APEXX has
navigated PCI DSS, ISO 27001 and won a shower of industry awards, including the
Payments Awards “Most Disruptive Payments” solution twice during her tenure.
Having risen to the role of SVP of Operations, she sits as the youngest member
of the APEXX Executive Management Team and has overseen the boarding of
enterprise merchants such ASOS, Avon, eShopWorld, and many more.

Farrer entered the professional workforce in London when she arrived from New
Zealand at the age of 19. Opting not to go to university, she is an advocate for
alternative paths to career success and completing extracurricular learning
while on the job. Prior to APEXX, Farrer scaled up the operations for Europe’s
first mobile payment solution, Yoyo Wallet. Through professional training
qualifications and her experience during her career, Farrer has cultivated a
deep knowledge of operating frameworks and payment technologies to drive both
business success and her professional success. Farrer is a passionate business
leader who pays it forward as an active mentor in the COO Mentor Stories
program, empowering the next generation of operational leaders.

 

2. Priya Shah, CarePay International
Title: Director of Risk and Privacy Compliance

Priya Shah is currently the Director of Risk and Privacy Compliance at CarePay,
a healthtech company challenging the status quo in developing countries where
fraud, high healthcare costs, and lack of trust is a major problem resulting in
millions of people falling into poverty every year. CarePay has developed a
platform aimed at increasing transparency, reducing cost, and ultimately
enhancing the end-to-end experience for members, healthcare providers, Health
insurers and donors.

The platform has processed one million health insurance claims and is enabling
five million users to be able to save and acquire healthcare services digitally
via a network of 4,600 healthcare facilities in Kenya and Nigeria. Some of the
recognition CarePay has received includes being named a 2018 World Economic
Forum Technology Pioneer and being top 10 in Fortune's 2021 Change-the-World
list.

In the last five years at CarePay, Shah has held various leadership roles,
pioneering solutions to address the multiple challenges impacting digital
adoption in healthcare. Her health insurance experience coupled with her medical
background have been instrumental in shaping the CarePay platform, product, and
operational strategies. Shah’s growth mindset and her people centric leadership
style have enabled her to thrive in the most challenging and unfamiliar
situations. Before joining CarePay, Shah worked with AAR Health Services and as
a consultant for 18 years designing and implementing digital solutions within
healthcare delivery and insurance to enable transformation. Shah has a degree in
Pharmacy from the John Moore’s University and a Master’s Degree in Prescribing
Sciences from the University of Aberdeen.

 

3. Sonia Dorais, Chaser
Title: Chief Executive Officer

Sonia Dorais is Chief Executive Officer of Chaser, the market-leading accounts
receivables automation software and credit control services provider. As a
result of Dorais’ leadership and new strategic direction for Chaser throughout
the first year of her appointment as CEO, company revenues have increased by
103%, and the business’ total addressable market increased by 700%. Dorais
embodies Chaser’s vision to create a world where all businesses have the
confidence they will get paid for their work, and under her leadership, Chaser
has helped businesses worldwide chase and recover over $10 billion in late
payments.

Prior to this role, Dorais led the growth of numerous fintechs in Canada and the
U.K. that specialized in digitization and automation of finance and accounting
tasks and functions. With nearly 20 years’ experience in fast-growing
businesses, she is driven by a passion for helping people and businesses reach
their full potential. Dorais has been recognized for her accomplishments by
being shortlisted for CEO of the Year (Management Today Inspiring Women in
Business Awards, 2021). Previously, Dorais worked as CMO at cap-table and ESOP
software Capdesk and was CMO for accounts payable platform Compleat Software.

 

4. Keeley Vaughan-Davies, DOCOMO Digital (tie)
Title: Chief People Officer

Keeley Vaughan-Davies joined DOCOMO Digital, the international payments
subsidiary of NTT DOCOMO, in early 2020. She has been instrumental in driving
the transformation of the human resources function, especially the shift to
managing remote work in the wake of the pandemic. Vaughan-Davies has also been
responsible for driving a people-first culture and values that are aligned with
the business’s vision and mission. A commercially-minded strategic senior HR
leader, she has extensive experience working in global markets, and she has led
transformation including culture change, M&A, integration, and increasing
performance and agility. She has a record of success working in the payments,
fintech, and financial services industries within PE and privately owned
companies.

Vaughan-Davies served as the Head of HR at MoneyGram International before
joining DOCOMO Digital. A British national, Vaughan-Davies has espoused an
international outlook, having been raised in New Zealand, where she began her
professional journey with Telecom Directories. She has since held HR leadership
roles across Asia Pacific, Europe, and the Middle East, leading large HR
transformation projects and working closely with leadership teams in driving
meaningful business impact with people initiatives.

 

4. Simone Wittstruck, DOCOMO Digital (tie)
Title: Chief Financial Officer

Simone Wittstruck is the Chief Financial Officer at DOCOMO Digital, the
international payments subsidiary of NTT DOCOMO, the leading global telecom
brand. Wittstruck joined net mobile AG in 2009, a leading payments business that
was acquired by DOCOMO Digital. She has held a variety of leadership roles
during this time and has been instrumental in driving the company through
transformation and corporate restructuring. Wittstruck role-modelled the focus
on business strategy and profitability within the finance function and pioneered
the adoption of technology in every aspect.

Wittstruck brings a deep understanding of the evolution in regulation across the
EU as well as globally in both the telecom and financial services industries.
With her background in audit and tax consulting before joining DOCOMO Digital,
Wittstruck was able to drive the company’s inorganic growth initiatives from the
front. She served as the CFO for the GSA (Germany, Switzerland, Austria) region
and steered the business through the transition from technology to financial
services company. Wittstruck is passionate about fostering innovation in the
mobile payments space as a way to serve the underbanked communities around the
world and catalyze growth for DOCOMO Digital’s clients.

 

5. Laura Marshall, Finastra
Title: Chief Operating Officer, Europe

Laura Marshall, Chief Operating Officer of European operations at Finastra,
built her 20+ year career in the value engineering (VE) space and is passionate
about putting customer value at the heart of everything. She was part of a
pioneering VE team in enterprise software (at Siebel Systems) before moving to
Oracle and then Misys (now Finastra), where she set up the VE practice. Marshall
built Finastra’s VE function from scratch and created a dynamic department that
is firmly embedded across the company. It is recognized for delivering
excellence and has been awarded by Finastra’s parent company as a significant
new function within the Vista portfolio.

As a result of that success, Marshall became Chief of Staff to Finastra’s Chief
Product and Technology Officer. Then, she took on the newly-created role of COO,
Europe, acting as an operational and strategic partner to the sales leader,
responsible for governance of sales and pre-sales, strategic planning, and
forward-looking activities. She has contributed to reshaping sales, pre-sales,
and other go-to-market functions at Finastra to ensure that return on customer
investment is the organization’s fundamental operating principle. Her
determination to form a strong partnership between intelligent, results-oriented
governance and a value-based selling process has seen amazing success and
contributed to significant growth in Europe.

 

6. Maria Campbell, Griffin
Title: Vice President, People

Maria Campbell is the Vice President of People at Griffin, a banking as a
service provider, currently seeking approval from the PRA and FCA to become the
U.K.’s first platform bank. Purpose-built for the next wave of fintech growth,
Griffin aims to combine the power of a best-in-class API-first platform with the
robust controls of a fully authorized bank. Campbell, who has been with Griffin
for just over a year, is focusing on ensuring the company’s people-first culture
continues to evolve and thrive amidst rapid growth.

Prior to joining Griffin, Campbell led commercially-minded, inclusive people
strategies at high-growth startups including GoCardless, Snyk, Permutive, and
Monzo, where she supported the company to grow its headcount by 1,500% in two
years. Believing culture is a company’s most important asset, she is passionate
about developing human-first structures that make work both enjoyable and
fulfilling, and helps teams to grow quickly, healthily, and deliberately.
Campbell received a Master of Arts in Philosophy from the University of
Cambridge and a Master of Arts in English and American Literature from the
University of Kent.

 

7. Laura Pappi, HyperJar
Title: Head of Operations

Laura Pappi joined HyperJar—the award-winning, free money management and
spending account—as employee number 12 in 2019. Tasked with building a customer
support service from scratch, just six months later Pappi had created a global,
hybrid, scalable team capable of working remotely—a year before the pandemic
made this business-critical. She is now head of operations with a team of 35
reporting to her, including regulatory compliance, HR, customer support, and
onboarding functions.

HyperJar is Pappi’s first foray into fintech after 8 years working in catering
and fashion tech start-ups in the U.K. and football journalism in her native
Italy (Juventus is a passion). She earned her Masters in International Relations
at the University of Venice Cà Foscari after earning a Bachelor of Arts in
European literature. Pappi’s work philosophy is to create a strong team culture
that is “clear and kind.” Feedback is given often and positively, everyone is
listened to, and training, development, and promotion from within the team is
the default. Colleagues praise her intelligence, pace of work, and willingness
to tackle (and master) new challenges every day. She praises her colleagues’
ability to put up with regular, detailed updates on Italy’s global sporting
dominance.

 

8. Jenna Wright, LMAX Group
Title: Managing Director

Jenna Wright leads LMAX Digital, the leading institutional cryptocurrency
exchange and part of the wider LMAX Group. As Managing Director, Wright has led
LMAX Digital from its launch in May 2018. Today, she runs a multimillion-pound
business within LMAX Group, with a cross functional team comprised of associates
around the world, from account management, liquidity provision, technology,
custody, and sales. Through her foresight in spotting the potential in the
institutional cryptocurrency market, Wright has clearly established herself as
one of the most innovative and agile women in the U.K. fintech space.

Wright graduated from the University of Manchester with a Bachelor of Arts in
Economics and Politics before joining LMAX Group in January 2009. Prior to
becoming Managing Director of LMAX Digital, Wright held multiple senior
managerial roles at LMAX Group, including Head of Broker Operations and Head of
Client Services.

 

9. Bronwyn Boyle, Mambu
Title: Chief Information Security Officer

Bronwyn Boyle is CISO at Mambu, the cloud banking platform where modern
financial experiences are built. Mambu gives financial institutions a powerful
competitive edge by allowing them to rapidly create, launch, and service any
lending or deposit portfolio through a modern SaaS banking platform. Boyle is
accountable for the security of Mambu and for fostering security across the
ecosystem of composable products and customers utilizing Mambu to open financial
services, promote innovation, and support financial inclusion across underserved
communities around the globe.

Boyle was previously Head of Security & Counter-Fraud at the Open Banking
Implementation Entity in the U.K., playing an instrumental role in fostering
secure adoption of open banking and improving the security of 600+ companies
enrolled in the ecosystem. Her focus on driving increased, secure adoption of
open banking oversaw a 25% uplift in individuals and businesses choosing to
securely share their financial data with new and innovative products and
services, boosting competition across retail banking. Boyle has provided
security consultancy to small to medium enterprises, worked with Lloyds Banking
Group, served as an advisor for 10x Future Technologies, worked for Big Four
organizations, and served as Director of Information Risk Management at Barclays
Bank. In 2021, Boyle was named to the Top 21 Most Inspiring Women in Cyber by IT
Security Guru. Boyle received her Master of Science in Security & Forensic
Computing from Dublin City University, and a Master of Arts in Classical Studies
and a Higher Diploma in Computer Science from University College Dublin.

 

10. Fiona Roach Canning, Pollinate
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Product & Marketing Officer

Fiona Roach Canning is a Co-Founder and the Chief Product & Marketing Officer at
Pollinate, a company focusing on reinventing merchant acquisition for banks
around the world. She has been instrumental in building Pollinate from an idea
to a company valued at over £100 million and employing over 150 people
worldwide. As part of this, Roach Canning spearheaded the development of a
bank-led loyalty platform for SMEs and consumers, which is live in the UK with
Tyl by NatWest. Roach Canning strongly believes in the importance of a diverse
workforce and is proud of Pollinate’s commitment that up to 10% of staff are
paid interns and apprentices. She has featured in Startups magazine and Global
Banking & Finance Review, and she has spoken at events such as Money20/20.

Prior to co-founding Pollinate, Roach Canning spent four years working with
Nectar, where she was responsible for strategy, innovation, and product
development. This was preceded by a role as Head of Strategic Insight at Visa,
where she first realized the power of consumer spending data, which would go on
to underpin her work at Pollinate. Before this, her experience as a management
consultant gave her the opportunity to work with blue chip brands such as UBS,
Samsung, MAS, and Pepsi, creating customer-driven product innovation. Roach
Canning received her Master of Arts in Mathematics from the University of
Cambridge.

 

11. Trudy Ross, Quantile
Title: Chief Operating Officer

Trudy Ross is the Chief Operating Officer at Quantile, which delivers
market-leading post-trade optimization services to the largest financial
institutions globally. By reducing risk, capital, and notional requirements,
Quantile increases market liquidity and accelerates a safer financial system
that’s better for all. In 2016, Ross was the third employee to join Quantile and
has been integral to the company’s substantial growth. The company is widely
recognized as a market leader in its field and has over 90 employees who are
based in offices in London, New York, and Amsterdam—with Tokyo coming soon. More
recently, Quantile announced that it is soon to be acquired by the London Stock
Exchange Group plc.

Prior to her time at Quantile, Ross held senior positions at Deutsche Bank,
including Global COO of Clearing Sales and Global Business Manager for Rates
Trading. She also served on the executive committee of the OTCDeriv board for 10
years. A strong advocate for women in fintech, Ross encourages everyone to
prioritize the company and its culture ahead of roles. Ross holds a Master’s
Degree from the University of Auckland.

 

12. Tania Calvo, RavenPack
Title: Chief Operating Officer

Tania Calvo is the Chief Operating Officer of RavenPack, which was founded in
2003 and designs big data analytics services that conduct financial analysis.
RavenPack Analytics transforms unstructured big data sets, such as traditional
news and social media, into structured granular data and indicators to help
financial services firms improve their performance. Calvo joined RavenPack in
2003 as Senior Vice President of Administration and HR before being appointed
COO in 2017. She’s been instrumental in shaping RavenPack's foundations as a
commercial entity and is a recognized leader by her peers.

With more than 15 years of experience in similar positions, Calvo is a
multi-talented, versatile, and experienced manager who has helped develop and
strengthen companies from start-up organizations to large, privately held
companies with a global presence. Before RavenPack, she worked in the legal,
healthcare, and service sectors.

 

13. Julia Markiewicz, Silent Eight
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer

Julia Markiewicz is a Co-Founder and the Chief Operating Officer of Silent
Eight, a technology company that uses AI-powered solutions to combat money
laundering and terrorist financing. Markiewicz holds a Master’s Degree in Social
Policy and is passionate about innovation and inspiring people to reach their
potential. Specifically, she is driven to activate every member of the team to
achieve their maximum growth through learning and development. Based in
Singapore, her unique management style is a primary catalyst behind Silent
Eight’s heavy investment in research and development and is a key driver in the
expansion of the team’s geographical footprint.

Prior to Silent Eight, Markiewicz has a history of entrepreneurial activities,
including founding her own startup, Fabryka Kadr, a leading European provider of
human resources services that brought many modern HR concepts to the mass
market. Markiewicz is a member of 100Women in Fintech Directory, a founding
member of RegTech Women, and has been listed among the Financial Technology
Report’s “Top 25 Women Leaders in Financial Technology” in both 2020 and 2021.

 

14. Pamela Mead, SumUp
Title: Vice President of Global Design

Pamela Mead joined SumUp in 2019 to head up the Design organization—encompassing
Product, Brand, and User Research—with global responsibility. She is
spearheading the effort to turn SumUp’s services into a cohesive, powerful, and
personal SuperApp experience that serves a merchant’s breadth of needs when
running their business. Her team is establishing the narrative for SumUp’s UX
strategy—from brand expression to experience and service principles. She has
been establishing user research as a foundational practice for all product,
marketing, and design work with a strong focus on empathy building aligned with
SumUp’s mission.

Mead has spent the last 15 years building design teams and practices in
successful companies such as Delivery Hero, HERE Technologies, Telefónica, and
Yahoo!. At Yahoo!, she led the mobile-focused team centered on Connected Life,
which was an early concept of a connecting experience of mobile, TV, and
computers into a single communication space. She moved to Madrid in 2011 to set
up a customer-driven innovation practice at Telefónica, succeeding in engaging
both businesses and key stakeholders in the design process and customer-focused
practices.

Mead holds a Master’s Degree in Design and Communication from the Illinois
Institute of Technology. She is a passionate leader who empowers teams to find
ways to solve the right problems in ways that delight through their simplicity,
effectiveness, and integrity.

 

15. Georgina Nelson, TruRating
Title: Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Georgina Nelson studied Psychology at the University of Leeds, where she became
fascinated with how to measure, understand, and predict human behavior. She
realized that the key to everything was data you could trust, which required
sample sizes not usually seen in market research. After graduating, Nelson took
a turn into law, working first in finance with Clifford Chance LLP before
joining Europe’s largest consumer association, Which?, representing consumer
privacy and data issues at an EU and U.K. Government level.

It was at Which? that Nelson identified a market need for representative
consumer feedback. Putting two and two together, she created TruRating, a
point-of-sale rating system that, by making feedback super simple and super
quick, achieves what other survey tools fail to do—create mass, genuine customer
data samples at speed. TruRating doesn’t stop there; all data is shared back to
consumers via profile pages to ensure that the data exchange is a fair one for
both parties. With over 300 million ratings collected worldwide, TruRating is
now the world’s largest platform of validated consumer ratings.

 

16. Anna Gladka, Volt
Title: Business Development Director

Anna Gladka joined Volt as Business Development Director in 2021. Volt is one of
Europe’s fastest-growing fintechs and integrates domestic open payments networks
to a single point of access. In doing so, it enables businesses around the world
to accept real-time, account-to-account payments from their customers in the
same seamless way. Gladka joined Volt shortly after its record-breaking $23.5
million Series A funding round. Since then, she’s been an outstanding success in
securing key relationships and marquee account wins.

Gladka was previously Sales Manager at Zalando—one of Europe’s greatest startup
success stories—where she led sales for the brand-new Zalando Shipping
Solutions. Gladka was responsible for creating market strategy, outreach, and
internal and external stakeholder management. She also led and created account
management processes with leading fashion brands. Prior to Zalando, Gladka was
Senior Sales Manager at Wirecard—specifically in the digital entertainment
vertical. The company provided outsourcing and white-label solutions for
electronic payments worldwide.

Gladka participated in a special needs childcare volunteer program in 2016.
During a two-month summer camp for disabled and special needs children, she was
responsible for organizing daily entertainment activities. Gladka received her
Master of Science in Economics, Innovation, and Change from Friedrich Schiller
University Jena and her second Master of Science in Global Entrepreneurship
Economics and Management from Università degli Studi dell'Insubria. She also
holds a Bachelor’s in International Economics and Management from Kyiv National
Economic University.

 

17. Sasha Mazhar, Yobota
Title: Head of People

Sasha Mazhar is currently the Head of People at Yobota, where she built and
embedded the HR infrastructure and people strategy, enhancing operational and
security compliance processes. She oversees talent development, culture,
engagement, and recruitment across the business as well as providing HR updates
to the Board, delivering an inclusive HR function that nurtures high growth
across a rapidly scaling fintech business. Yobota delivers an award-winning,
cloud-based core banking platform and has recently entered the banking as a
service (BaaS) space.

Mazhar’s continuous work on improving workplace engagement was recognized when
Yobota achieved the 2021 Best Companies “Ones to Watch” award based on positive
workplace engagement practice. In July 2021, Mazhar successfully led the
business’s
seamless transition into hybrid working, building on existing processes,
policies, and
technology as well as educating and informing the workforce, creating a positive
employee experience, and gearing the company to secure its third client as a
result.

Prior to her time at Yobota, Mazhar worked in creative, media, and PR
industries, having
managed the growth of HR functions for large-scale international businesses
across the
EMEA markets and supporting business executives on implementing company
strategy.
Mazhar received her Master’s in Human Resource Management and International
Business from Edinburgh Napier University and graduated with Joint Honors from
the University of Strathclyde in Law and Human Resource Management. She
frequently contributes advice and insight on key HR topics across various
platforms in the industry.

 

18. Deepika Gupta, ING
Title: Global IT Lead of Tribe Cash Management

Deepika Gupta is the Global IT Lead of Tribe Cash Management for ING, a
multinational banking and financial services corporation that covers retail,
direct, commercial, investment, wholesale, and private banking in addition to
asset management and insurance services. Gupta serves ING by creating and
embedding strategies associating multiple IT solutions into one platform to
provide seamless customer experiences. She has also spearheaded and managed her
business unit with a keen focus on enabling digital treasurers of key clients.
In her time with the company, she has increased employee engagement by
identifying IT trends in markets and through a systematic focus on
craftsmanship.

Before working her way up to her current position within ING, Gupta was a
project manager, a scrum master, an IT integrator, and then an IT manager
handling financial markets, end-to-end payments chain test automation, and PSD2
APIs. She came to the company from Infosys, where she filled several positions
culminating in an analyst role for client ABN AMRO. Gupta holds several
certifications, including Professional Scrum Product Owner and Financial Markets
Intermediate Practitioner, and she is a Lean Sigma Six Black Belt.

 

19. Alyona Andronikova, Moneyveo
Title: Chief Operating Officer

Alyona Andronikova is the Group Chief Executive Officer of Moneyveo, a leader in
instant online non-bank lending. The company provides end-to-end automated
lending and the highest service speed. It makes payday loans accessible, fast,
easy, and transparent whenever customers need them, with no need to visit
offices or waste time qualifying. Today, over one million people use Moneyveo,
enjoying the benefits of one-minute loan approval, a less than one-minute
application process for regular customers, and a six-minute application for new
customers. Andronikova was initially the COO of Moneyveo before taking the CEO
position in 2018. As transformational leader and expert in rearrangement of
processes according to Lean-concept, she has developed an innovative strategy
that results in proven business growth, improvement, and efficiency.

Prior to joining Moneyveo, Andronikova gained 20 years of experience in the
industry, including 10 years in business management. Notably, she was group CFO
as well as COO for Nenfit Systems. She is also a certified expert in Six Sigma
Methodology and ACCA DipIFR. Now, under Andronikova’s leadership, Moneyveo has
entered the international market, developed new services, and received a number
of prestigious national and international awards. Andronikova earned a Master’s
in Accounting and Audit from the Cherkasy Engineering and Technological
Institute, a Master’s in Finance and Financial Management Services from
Evropejs'kij Universitet Financiv, Informacijnih Sistem, Menedment ta Bisnesu,
Kiiv, and an Executive Master of Business Administration from IE Business
School.

 

20. Katja Hunstock, finleap
Title: Chief Product Officer

As Chief Product Officer, Katja Hunstock oversees the finleap product market-fit
analysis and product roadmap. Finleap is an independent Open Banking platform
that addresses the fragmented open banking landscape with a “full-stack”
platform. Hunstock is responsible for defining and leading the company’s product
strategy and vision in order to realize the international growth plans of its
Open Banking platform. In her previous role as the head of BU Open Banking, she
drove the company’s technology-based innovation and development, in particular
further development of its Open Banking products, which comprises finleap
connect’s core product line.

Prior to joining finleap in 2019 as a principal product manager and working her
way to head its Open Banking BU, Hunstock held several leadership roles at
GetYourGuide and Delivery Hero. She also worked in inside sales for Hewlett
Packard, where she was able to increase client enrollments by 25% by her third
year. Hunstock graduated from Instituto Universitário de LisboaI with a
Bachelor’s in Economics and completed the ThePowerMBA Program at ThePower
Business School.

 

21. Julie Watts, Kurtosys
Title: Head of Onboarding Management

Julie Watts is the Head of Onboarding Management for Kurtosys. She works with
new and current customers to empower financial services firms to build bigger
and better businesses through sustained growth via the Kurtosys Cloud, a unique
digital experience platform built for the needs of the most demanding
enterprises on the planet. Her team is also responsible for managing
enhancements and new features for current customers. Typical onboarding projects
include configuration of websites and digital marketing tools, documents, and
client reporting portals. In nearly a decade with the company, Watts has also
served as Implementation Manager, Head of Program Management and Technology,
Director of Business Operations, Professional Services Lead for North America,
and, most recently, Head of Pre-Sales.

Watts brings over 25 years of experience in financial services technology, with
a background in project management and a deep understanding of data, technology,
and UI/UX. Prior to Kurtosys, she was a VP for Thomson Reuters and a GRIS
Administration Manager for Merrill Lynch. Watts received a Master of Education
in English Education as well as a Bachelor of Arts in Education from the
University of Buffalo.

 

22. Sarah Ratner, Lendable
Title: Chief Operating Officer

Sarah Ratner is the Chief Operating Officer at Lendable, a leading debt finance
provider to fintech companies across frontier and emerging markets. Lendable
creates access to new financial products and services for unbanked as well as
underbanked populations. The company finances fintech companies that facilitate
consumer and MSME credit, productive asset finance, payments, remittances, and
digital marketplaces. Lendable has so far disbursed over $225 million to
fintechs in more than 14 countries. Ratner’s role tasks her with augmenting her
company’s portfolio to keep pace with its geographical expansion and other
ambitions, while also assuring that quality remains consistent in its
operations.

Prior to her current role, Ratner was Lendable’s Head of Customer Operations and
Project Manager for The Economist magazine. Ratner studied performing arts and
philosophy at Oxford Brookes University.

 

23. Seema Desai, iwoca
Title: Chief Operating Officer

Seema Desai is Chief Operations Officer at iwoca, which offers credit facilities
to small businesses trading in the U.K. and Germany via an automated lending
platform. She joined iwoca in 2017 as Head of People, developing iwoca’s talent
and organizational capabilities. In her current role, she has scaled the
exceptional customer service that propelled iwoca to its status as one of the
fastest growing business lenders in the U.K. A passionate advocate of equal
opportunities, she also leads iwoca’s efforts to achieve greater diversity and
inclusion across the fintech industry, which reflects her former role as the
company’s Head of People.

Prior to joining iwoca, Desai led the development of the Innovative Finance ISA
at peer-to-peer lender Zopa as its Head of Product. Before that, she helped
members drive financial inclusion in emerging markets at GSMA, the trade body of
mobile network operators, and she gained experience in traditional banking as
Head of Retail Savings Products at Halifax and Bank of Scotland (HBOS). Desai
began her career with Accenture as a Strategy Manager. She studied Natural
Sciences at the University of Cambridge.

 

24. Tatiana Rozoum, Fintecture
Title: Co-Founder

Tatiana Rozoum is the Co-Founder of Fintecture, the first instant bank-to-bank
payment solution in France. Fintecture is a secure and scalable API gateway
connecting businesses to banks to initiate transactions and access their
customers’ bank account data. Rozoum oversees operational and regulatory
aspects. She built the core team that took the startup from just a project to a
leading European firm in payments initiation. She is an innovator and
communicator who understands a team dynamic.

Rozoum comes from a regulatory background. Prior to founding Fintecture, she
served as Director in a U.K. e-money institution, worked as legal counsel at the
French Prudential Supervisory Authority, and was a consultant focusing on
fintech, digital commerce, and blockchain businesses. This background has given
Rozoum a broad perspective on the challenges that stakeholders face in the
fintech space and helped her develop an understanding of overcoming regulatory
and operational challenges in the payments sector. Rozoum received a double
Bachelor of Law in French and Russian Law, as well a Master’s in Business Law
from the Université Paris Nanterre. She also holds a Masters 2 in Finance and
Law from the Université Paris Dauphine – PSL.

 

25. Camille Leca, Euronext (tie)
Title: Chief Operating Officer of Listing and Head of Listing in France,
Portugal, and Spain

Camille Leca is the Chief Operating Officer of Listing for pan-European stock
exchange Euronext in addition to being the company’s Head of Listing in France,
Portugal, and Spain. She oversees all commercial efforts for prospection and
client coverage in the region, covering 950 issues with an average of 40 new
listings annually. She is also in charge of the promotion of capital markets via
bilateral meetings, events, and initiatives. In her nearly nine years with
Euronext, she has also been a Small and Mid-Cap Analyst, a Project Manager,
Chief of Staff to the CEO of Euronext Paris, and Chairman and CEO of EnterNext,
a subsidiary of Euronext dedicated to financing and promoting small and mid-caps
in financial markets.

In addition to her Euronext duties, Leca is currently associated with AMF, ESMA,
and the Federation of European Securities Exchanges, the last of which she
serves as Chair of the FESE Listing Experts Task Force. She is also a board
member of Euronext Paris, Oslo Børs, and Cercle des Administrateurs. Leca earned
a Bachelor of Law, Master in Public Law, and
Master in Business Law from University of Paris I: Panthéon-Sorbonne, and also
received a degree with a major in Finance from ESCP Business School.

 

25. Helena Straussmann, Crunch (tie)
Title: Head of Transformation and Product

Helena Straussmann is the Head of Transformation and Product at Crunch, a highly
successful cloud accountancy SaaS SME established in 2009. Crunch provides
slick, powerful, and easy to use accountancy software developed in-house, making
lives easier for thousands of freelancers, contractors, and small businesses in
the U.K. Along with the pioneering software comes the ultimate feature: real
experts in service, accountancy, bookkeeping, and payroll. Crunch has won an
array of prestigious national business and accountancy awards over the years,
including Large Firm of the Year in the U.K. Accounting Excellence Awards in
2019. Crunch also enjoyed its first ever crowdfunding raise in 2021, beating its
target after attracting the interest of investors seeing business growth
potential from further product development.

Straussmann has been instrumental in developing a product roadmap to continually
enhance the offerings of Crunch to its members, and in particular the
development of the “Crunch Free” software, where the monetization from signups
continues to exceed expectations. During a glittering 12-year career at Crunch,
Straussmann was most recently promoted to Head of Transformation & Product in
2019 and is part of the Crunch Senior Leadership Team. Previously, as a founding
employee, Straussmann progressed through the ranks in a number of pivotal
service operations management roles.

Straussmann utilizes her immense knowledge of Crunch, together with exceptional
project management and organizational skills and exceptional drive, reflected in
her earlier academic success, to achieve outstanding results. She received her
Bachelor of Arts Honors degree in English Language and Literature from the
University of Brighton.

jirehl

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