The Financial Technology Report is pleased to announce The Top 50 Financial Technology CEOs of 2023. Amongst an ocean of talented nominees, these leaders are worthy of special adulation for their roles in ushering in a wide range of digital solutions that continue to improve on traditional banking systems. This year's awardees are offering new ways for people around the globe to leverage the power of financial services, including mobile banking, digital payment platforms, online lending, and personal wealth management, among numerous areas.
A few notable awardees on 2023's list include Dan Schulman, who is revolutionizing the world of payments and mobile technology at PayPal; and Sebastian Siemiatkowski, CEO and Co-Founder of the Swedish payments giant Klarna, who has turned a university dream into a global empire in less than two decades; and Mitchell Elegbe, the Founder and CEO of Interswitch, which has gone from being a small start-up in Lagos, Nigeria, and turned into one of Africa's largest electronic payments and infrastructure companies.
From an extensive list of global nominees, these fintech executives were selected for their unwavering dedication to building a better future through the cultivation of emerging technologies in the finance space. Please join us in celebrating the achievements of the Top 50 Financial Technology CEOs of 2023.
1. Michael Hayford
Company: NCR
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Michael Hayford is the Chief Executive Officer of NCR Corporation. After joining NCR in 2018, he launched the 138-year-old company’s digital transformation initiative, establishing a customer-first culture focused on innovation. As CEO, Hayford has created a clear vision for the future of his company; and is focused on addressing the fundamentals of running stores, restaurants, and self-directed banking.
Prior to NCR, Hayford served in a wide variety of C-suite fintech roles. He was chief financial officer and corporate executive vice president of FIS, a Fortune 500 fintech, from 2009 until 2013. Additionally, he served as president and chief operating officer of Metavante Technologies, where he led a successful merger with FIS, creating the world’s largest financial technology company. He also served as a director of Endurance International Group Holdings, an IT services company specializing in web hosting. On top of that, from 2006-2018, he was on the board of West Bend Mutual Insurance Company, where he chaired the Audit Committee. Hayford received a Bachelor of Science in accounting and computer science from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. He also holds an MBA from Northwestern University.
2. Frank Bisignano
Company: Fiserv
Title: Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer
Frank Bisignano is Chairman of the Board, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Fiserv, a global leader in financial services and payments technology solutions. Bisignano joined Fiserv in 2019 through the acquisition of First Data, where he was chairman and CEO. At Fiserv, he initially led the company’s day-to-day operations as president and chief operating officer, before assuming the role of CEO in July 2020. In May of 2022, he added Chairman to his list of impressive titles.
Before joining First Data, Bisignano served as co-chief operating officer and CEO of Mortgage Banking at JPMorgan Chase & Co. With more than 30 years of executive leadership experience in banks and global financial institutions, Bisignano also served in multiple leadership positions at Citigroup – including chief administrative officer and CEO of the company’s global transaction services unit. Among a number of non-profit commitments, he serves on the boards of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum, the Mount Sinai Health System, and The Battery Conservancy. In addition, he is a member of the Business Roundtable, a U.S.-based association of CEOs who use public policy to promote a thriving economy and expanded opportunities for Americans.
3. Dan Schulman
Company: PayPal
Title: President and Chief Executive Officer
Sitting at the helm of PayPal, one of the largest fintechs on the globe, Dan Schulman is revolutionizing the world of payments and mobile technology. Schulman, who has been with his company since 2014, is no stranger to the industry. Prior to serving as President and CEO of PayPal, he served as group president of enterprise growth at American Express, where he was responsible for the company's global strategy to expand alternative mobile and online payment services, form new partnerships, and build more revenue streams. Prior to joining American Express, Schulman was president of the prepaid group at Sprint Nextel Corporation, following its acquisition of Virgin Mobile USA, where he led the company as its founding CEO for eight years. Earlier in his career, Schulman was president and CEO of Priceline Group, where he led the company through a period of rapid growth and expansion. He also spent 18 years at AT&T, where he held a series of positions, including president of the Consumer Markets Division.
Away from the office, Schulman is actively involved with numerous economic organizations, including the board of the Business Roundtable, the World Economic Forum, and the board of The Economic Club of New York. Schulman earned a Bachelor of Arts from Middlebury College and an MBA from NYU’s Stern School of Business. His many professional accomplishments have earned him honorary doctorates from Rutgers University and Middlebury College.
4. Michael Miebach
Company: Mastercard
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Michael Miebach is Chief Executive Officer of Mastercard, the second-largest payment-processing corporation worldwide. In this role, he is shaping the future of seamless commerce, while bolstering cyber services and data-powered insights. Miebach joined Mastercard in 2010 to lead its Middle East and Africa operations. In this role, he helped lead the company’s financial inclusion efforts: first in Africa and subsequently around the world. Earlier in his career, Miebach held senior roles at Barclays Bank and Citibank.
In addition to his time at Mastercard, Miebach proudly serves on the U.S. Treasury Advisory Committee on Racial Equity, where he is focused on advancing racial equity in the economy. Furthermore, among his numerous civic commitments, he is a member of The Business Roundtable, The Business Council, the U.S.-India CEO Forum, the International Advisory Panel of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, and The International Business Council of the World Economic Forum. Additionally, he sits on the board of directors for the Metropolitan Opera; and serves as a board member at large for the Ronald McDonald House New York City. Miebach holds an MBA from the University of Passau in Germany.
5. Ryan McInerney
Company: Visa
Title: Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Ryan McInerney is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Visa, one of the world's largest digital payments networks. Founded in 1958, Visa facilitates payments transactions between consumers, merchants, financial institutions, and government entities – across more than 200 countries and territories.
McInerney joined the payments giant in 2013. Prior to assuming the role of CEO in February 2023, he was president, responsible for his company’s global businesses. Prior to joining Visa, he served as CEO of consumer banking for JPMorgan Chase, a business with more than 75,000 employees and revenues of approximately $14 billion. Previously, McInerney served as chief operating officer for home lending; and as chief risk officer for Chase’s consumer businesses. He also served as Chase’s head of product and marketing for consumer banking. Earlier in his career, McInerney was a principal at McKinsey & Company, working in the firm’s retail banking and payments practices. The highly accomplished executive received a Bachelor of Science in finance from the University of Notre Dame.
6. Sasan Goodarzi
Company: Intuit
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Sasan Goodarzi is Chief Executive Officer of Intuit, where he leads the company towards delivering on its mission of powering prosperity around the world. He assumed the role on Jan 1, 2019. Intuit is the global technology platform that helps consumers and small businesses overcome their most important financial challenges. During his 14 years with the company, Goodarzi has successfully led each of Intuit’s largest businesses. Most recently, he served as executive vice president and general manager of Intuit’s small business and self-employed group. He also served as: executive vice president and general manager of Intuit’s consumer tax group, as Intuit’s chief information officer, as the general manager of Intuit’s ProTax organization, and as the general manager of Intuit’s Financial Services Division.
Before coming to Intuit, Goodarzi worked for Invensys, serving as global president of the products group. Additionally, he held a number of senior leadership roles in the automation control division at Honeywell; and served as the CEO and co-founder of a technology startup, Lazer Cables. He earned his bachelor’s in electrical engineering at the University of Central Florida and an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
7. Simon Paris
Company: Finastra
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Simon Paris is the Chief Executive Officer of Finastra, one of the largest fintech companies in the world. In this position, he takes responsibility for Finastra’s overall strategic direction and growth – steering the company as it becomes a leading ecosystem orchestrator for providers and consumers of financial services everywhere. He joined Finastra as president in 2015, was appointed deputy CEO in 2017, and became CEO in June 2018.
Paris, who regularly speaks at large-scale fintech events, brings more than 25 years of sales, management, and global leadership expertise to the company. Prior to joining Finastra, he held the role of president of SAP's industry cloud business. Before that, he was a senior consultant with McKinsey & Company. A firm believer in the principles of doing well by doing good, Paris chairs the World Trade Board and is passionate about how technology and open trade can drive financial inclusion and improve society. He holds an MBA from the INSEAD Business School in France, and a bachelor's in business and European languages from the European Business School.
8. Alyssa Henry
Company: Square
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Alyssa Henry spent nearly nine years at Square before assuming her current CEO role. Square, which is part of Block, is a financial services platform that is aimed at small-and medium-size businesses. With Square, customers can accept credit card payments and use phones or tablets as payment registers for a point-of-sale system. Henry joined Square in 2014, serving in different executive functions before accepting the CEO position in February 2023.
Prior to Square, Henry honed her skills at tech giants like Amazon and Microsoft. Most recently, she served as VP of Amazon Web Services (AWS) storage services. Before that, she spent more than 11 years at Microsoft, which includes a stint as the product unit manager for the company's SQL server data access. Besides her duties at Square, she serves on the boards of Intel, software firm Unity Technologies, and data company Confluent. Henry graduated from University of California, Los Angeles with a Bachelor of Science in mathematics, with a specialization in computing.
9. Nik Storonsky
Company: Revolut
Title: Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
British businessman of Russian origin, Nik Storonsky is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the financial technology company Revolut, a U.K.-based app with more than 27 million retail customers worldwide. Revolut, one of Europe's top unicorns, offers a wide range of services, including currency exchange, surcharge-free ATMs, global transfer payments, and budgeting. Founded in 2015, it has since handled more than 350 million transactions for more than 10 million global customers. Storonsky, who got his professional start trading derivatives, made the 2022 Forbes Billionaires List with an estimated wealth of $7.1 billion due to the success of Revolut.
He holds a Master of Science in applied physics and mathematics from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology. He also holds a Master of Arts in economics from the New Economic School, Moscow. Prior to Revolut, he worked at Credit Suisse and Lehman Brothers, where he traded over $2 billion across various options, swaps, and FX instruments. In addition to love of fintech, Storonsky is an avid kite surfer, mountaineer, and championship swimmer.
10. Sebastian Siemiatkowski
Company: Klarna
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Sebastian Siemiatkowski, the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Klarna, has been with the company for nearly two decades. A Swedish tech unicorn, Klarna has expanded its operations to include offices in London, New York, Berlin, and other locations. The primary objective of Klarna is to establish itself as the preferred global shopping platform, offering flexible and secure financial services to consumers. Their diverse range of products and services encompasses payments, social shopping, and personal finances. Since its inception, Klarna has been dedicated to revolutionizing the retail banking industry.
In 2005, Siemiatkowski founded Klarna with Niklas Adalberth and Victor Jacobsson, when they were all students at the Stockholm School of Economics. Right away the main idea behind Klarna caught market traction: a payment system that allows you to buy now and pay later. Due to this early success, Siemiatkowski has spent his entire professional career at the top of the fintech world. He holds a master’s in economics and business from Stockholm School of Economics.
11. Sukhinder Singh Cassidy
Company: Xero
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Sukhinder Singh Cassidy was appointed as Xero’s Chief Executive Officer February 1, 2023. Xero is a global small business platform with 3.5 million subscribers, which includes a core accounting solution, payroll, workforce management, expenses and projects. Xero also has an extensive ecosystem of connected apps and connections to banks and other financial institutions helping small businesses access a range of solutions from within Xero’s open platform to help them run their business and manage their finances.
Cassidy is an experienced Silicon Valley executive with more than 25 years of global leadership experience. Previously she has served as president of Asia Pacific and Latin America at Google; president at StubHub; founder of the Boardlist; founder and CEO of Joyus; and co-founder of Yodlee. She also has significant public and private board experience with multiple companies.
12. Sashi Narahari
Company: HighRadius
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Sashi Narahari, the CEO and Co-Founder of HighRadius, brings a unique combination of business management expertise and technical knowledge to his leadership of his company’s overall corporate strategy. This focus on business process improvement is the driving philosophy behind HighRadius’ offerings; and results in its customers achieving peak financial performance through improvements such as reduced Days Sales Outstanding (DSO), greater operational efficiency, and increased deduction recovery.
Narahari has worked with many Fortune 1000 companies in implementing credit management, collections management, dispute management, and invoicing and payments solutions. Prior to HighRadius, he served as the CEO of Riversand Technologies, a provider of Master Data Management (MDM) solutions. Narahari holds a master’s in mechanical engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park; and a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras.
13. Anthony Noto
Company: SoFi
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Anthony Noto became Chief Executive Officer of SoFi in February 2018. SoFi is a member-centric, one-stop shop for digital financial services on a mission to help people achieve financial independence. The company’s full suite of financial products and services helps its nearly 5.7 million SoFi members borrow, save, spend, invest, and protect their money better.
Noto brings a great wealth of experience to his CEO role. Previously he served as COO of Twitter, joining the company in 2014. Before that, he was the co-head of Global Telecommunications, Media and Technology (TMT) Investment Banking at Goldman Sachs. He rejoined Goldman Sachs in October 2010 after serving as the National Football League’s executive vice president and chief financial officer for nearly three years. Prior to joining the NFL, Noto was the Internet, Entertainment, and Cable Equity Research analyst and business unit leader for the Communications, Media, and Entertainment Equity Research team at Goldman Sachs. Earlier, Noto worked at Lehman Brothers, where he was part of the Institutional Investor All-American Team covering the Broadline Retailing sector. Before transitioning to equity research, Noto was a brand manager at Kraft Foods and a captain in the U.S. Army.
14. Kristo Kaarmann
Company: Wise
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Kristo Kaarmann is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Wise, a global technology company building the best way to move money around the world. With the Wise account, individuals and businesses can hold over 50 currencies, move money between countries, and spend money abroad.
Prior to launching Wise, Kaarmann was a management consultant with Deloitte Consulting and PricewaterhouseCoopers. He worked with European banks and insurers to modernize their processes and systems. Stunned by their inefficiency, he teamed up with Taavet Hinrikus – then Skype's director of strategy – to develop an entirely new system for moving money across borders. In the past, Kaarmann was selected as one of the World Economic Forum’s Technology Pioneers for 2015. He holds a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Science in mathematics and computer science from Tartu University.
15. Pieter van der Does
Company: Adyen
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Pieter Van Der Does serves as the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Adyen, a prominent financial technology platform favored by esteemed enterprises. Adyen offers a comprehensive range of online services that enable merchants to effortlessly accept electronic payments through various methods, including credit cards, debit cards, wire transfers, and real-time bank transfers facilitated by online banking. Through its platform, Adyen establishes connections between merchants and an array of payment options, encompassing international credit cards, localized cash-based methods, and mobile payment solutions.
Prior to his involvement with Adyen, Van Der Does held the position of head of sales and account management at the Royal Bank of Scotland; and previously served as chief commercial officer at Bibit Global Payment Services. Early in his professional journey, he contributed to ING Nederland, specializing in operational management within corporate finance. Van Der Does attained a master's in economics from the University of Amsterdam, and an undergraduate degree in international economics from Clark University.
16. Bruce Lowthers
Company: Paysafe
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Bruce Lowthers joined Paysafe as its Chief Executive Officer in May, 2022. A high-profile payments and fintech executive, Lowthers is focused on driving growth for his company. Since taking the helm, he’s already implemented a number of changes, including re-setting the company’s growth strategy, simplifying its organizational structure from five business units to two, and recruiting significant talent into the company. These changes have already returned Paysafe to growth and created new momentum that the team is building on.
Prior to joining Paysafe, Lowthers spent 15 years at FIS, a Fortune 250 company operating in the merchant solutions, banking and capital markets. While at FIS, Lowthers most recently served as president and was responsible for growing the $15 billion revenue global organization with over 65,000 employees. In addition, Lowthers was an executive at eFunds, an electronic payments company, where he was in charge of all payment and risk products. Before that, he was a serial entrepreneur and successfully co-founded and led four start-up companies and two payments industry associations: American Transaction Processors Coalition (ATPC) and Payments 20 (P20), the global payments body. Lowthers holds a bachelor’s in business administration from the University of Massachusetts.
17. Mike Rosenbaum
Company: Guidewire Software
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Mike Rosenbaum serves as Guidewire’s Chief Executive Officer and has overall responsibility for the company’s global strategy, organization, culture, and operations. Guidewire is the platform P&C insurers trust to engage, innovate, and grow efficiently. They combine digital, core, analytics, and machine learning to deliver our platform as a cloud service.
Prior to Guidewire, Rosenbaum was part of the team at Salesforce for almost 14 years. During this time, he held several leadership positions and drove many of Salesforce’s most notable product achievements. Most recently, Rosenbaum served as EVP of product, leading the product management and go to market strategy for Salesforce’s core CRM product lines Sales Cloud, Service Cloud and Salesforce’s Platform business. He also led the launch of Salesforce Lightning, a next generation user experience framework. Prior to that, Rosenbaum was in charge of Salesforce’s Platform organization and the AppExchange ecosystem. Prior to Salesforce, he held various technology and marketing roles at Siebel Systems. He also spent five years serving in the U.S. Navy as a submarine officer onboard the USS Nevada. Rosenbaum is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy, where he earned a bachelor’s in systems engineering, and The Haas School of Business at the University of California Berkeley, where he earned an MBA.
18. Sergio Furio
Company: Creditas
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Founder
Sergio Furio is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Creditas, a leading online secured lending platform in Brazil. With $80 million in VC funding and 480 employees, the company is one of the top funded fintech companies in Latin America; and a reference in both innovation and talent management. By using consumers' properties (houses and cars) as collateral and reinventing the secured lending origination process, Creditas cuts the high interest rates that Brazilians pay for traditional consumer lending.
Before founding Creditas in 2012, Furio was a strategy consultant at The Boston Consulting Group in New York and Madrid. He also served as an investment banker at Deutsche Bank. In 2012, Furio founded BankFacil, a company that would later become Creditas.
19. Max Levchin
Company: Affirm
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Founder
Max Levchin is Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Affirm, a company that is on a mission to deliver honest financial products that improve lives. By building a new kind of payment network — one based on trust, transparency and putting people first — Affirm empowers millions of consumers to spend and save responsibly. In addition to Affirm, Levchin is the Co-Founder and Chairman of Glow, a data science company that empowers women and couples to take control of their sexual and reproductive health. He also is a Co-Founder and General Partner at SciFi VC. All three companies were created and launched from his innovation lab, HVF.
Notably, Levchin is a serial entrepreneur, computer scientist, philanthropist and active investor in more than 100 startups. In fact, Levchin was one of the original co-founders of PayPal, where he served as chief technology officer until its acquisition by eBay in 2002. In 2004, he founded Slide, which he sold to Google in 2010. Also in 2004, he helped start Yelp, where he was the first investor and chairman from 2004 until 2015. Over the years, he has served on several boards, including Yahoo!, Yelp, and Evernote.
20. John Caplan
Company: Payoneer
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Director
John Caplan is the Chief Executive Officer and Director of Payoneer. Caplan is a seasoned executive, investor, and entrepreneur with a track record of scaling companies in the digital economy. Payoneer is a financial technology company that empowers small and medium-sized businesses around the world to transact, conduct business, and expand globally.
Most recently, he was President of North America and Europe at Alibaba.com, the cross-border B2B business unit of Alibaba Group. In this role, he helped lead its transformation into one of Alibaba Group’s fastest-growing and most profitable business units. Caplan joined Alibaba’s team in 2017 following its acquisition of OpenSky, an SMB software platform he founded in 2009, which empowered ecommerce SMBs to optimize their distribution across marketplaces.
21. Harshil Mathur
Company: Razorpay
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Harshil Mathur, the Chief Executive Officer of Razorpay, is an Indian businessman, author, and entrepreneur. In the fintech field, he has brought his company to the peak of success. Razorpay is the only payments solution in India that allows businesses to accept, process and disburse payments with its product suite. It gives you access to all payment modes including credit card, debit card, netbanking, UPI, and numerous popular wallets.
From 1997 through 2009, Mathur attended Seedling Public School. He earned his bachelor's degree with a prime focus on mathematics in 2009. He then enrolled at the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee's Technology Department, majoring in software engineering. In 2013, he received his Bachelor of Technology. In 2015, he was a part of the YCombinator W15 Batch, where he was mentored by Paul Buchheit and Dalton Caldwell.
22. Joshua Reeves
Company: Gusto
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Josh is the CEO and Co-Founder of Gusto. Reeves believes in the power of software to solve complex problems. Gusto is a modern online people platform that supports small businesses with payroll, health insurance, 401(k)s, expert HR guidance, and team management tools. With offices in Denver, San Francisco, and New York, Gusto serves over 200,000 businesses and prioritizes diverse hiring practices to strengthen the company.
Their mission is to create a world where work empowers a better life. They are making the most complicated, impersonal business tasks simple and personal. Imagine payroll that brings everyone peace of mind, HR that transforms work into a community, and benefits that help people plan for a better future. Reeves earned his master's degree and an undergraduate degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University.
23. Henry Ward
Company: Carta
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Henry Ward is the CEO and Co-Founder of Carta. The company is trusted by more than 30,000 companies, over 5,000 investment funds, and half a million employees for cap table management, compensation management, liquidity venture capital solutions, and more. Carta’s liquidity solutions have returned $13 billion to shareholders in secondary transactions. The company has been included on the Forbes World’s Best Cloud Companies, Fast Company’s Most Innovative list, and Inc.’s Fastest-Growing Private Companies.
Prior to Carta, Ward founded and was the CEO of Secondsight, a portfolio optimization platform for retail investors. He also held leadership positions at software companies including Reddwerks Inc. and BetweenMarkets. Ward graduated from the University of Michigan with a bachelor’s in mathematics and computer science, and holds a master’s in market finance from the EDHEC Business School.
24. Alex Bouaziz
Company: Deel
Title: Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, Co-Founder
Alex Bouaziz is the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Deel, a mobile app that allows users to create collaborative videos with friends. Prior to Deel, Bouaziz was the co-founder and CEO of Lifeslice, a web platform that revolutionized day-to-day marketing by empowering companies with the right tools to collect thousands of authentic and relatable videos from their community. Before that, Bouaziz worked as a researcher in environmental engineering at Imperial College London, where he helped develop innovative and economically viable technologies to enhance the drinking water treatment process.
Bouaziz has a master's in civil and environmental engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a bachelor’s from the Israel Institute of Technology. Bouaziz also attended Y Combinator.
25. TS Anil
Company: Monzo
Title: Global Chief Executive Officer
TS Anil, the current Global Chief Executive Officer of Monzo, initially joined the organization in 2020 as the CEO of Monzo U.S. Founded as Mondo in 2015, Monzo gained widespread recognition when it set a remarkable record in February 2016 by raising more than $1 million in just 96 seconds through the Crowdcube investment platform, making it the fastest crowd-funding campaign in history. Since then, Monzo, a digital bank, has emerged as a disruptive force in the conventional banking model known for its complexity and opacity. The company’s accounts are characterized by their absence of fees, monthly minimums, and account charges.
Before assuming his current role, Anil held key positions such as the global head of payment products and platforms at Visa, as well as the global head of retail products at Standard Chartered Bank. In the early stages of his career, he served as a sales manager and credit manager at Citi India. Anil's academic background comprises an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, along with an undergraduate degree in economics from Shri Ram College of Commerce.
26. Valentin Stalf
Company: N26
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Valentin Stalf is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of N26. In 2013 he founded N26 with his longtime friend Maximilian Tayenthal. Since then, N26 has become one of the fastest-growing digital banks in the world. As a fully-licensed German bank built on the latest technology, N26 makes banking faster, easier, and more trustworthy. Overall, N26 has welcomed more than 8 million customers in 24 markets to date – and has raised close to $ 1.8 billion from some of the world’s most renowned investors. Headquartered in Berlin, N26 has offices in multiple cities around Europe.
Before N26, Stalf was an “Entrepreneur in Residence” for Rocket Internet, an incubator and investor in online startups. There, he helped to develop several companies in the mobile payments industry, including Payleven and Paymill GmbH. Moreover, he has worked in strategy consulting and investment banking. Stalf holds a bachelor’s in business administration and management. He also holds a master’s in accounting and finance from the University of St. Gallen. He is currently a member of the advisory board at the Vienna University of Economics and Business.
27. Kenneth Lin
Company: Credit Karma
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Founder
Ken Lin is the Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Credit Karma, a personal finance website dedicated to helping consumers better understand the power of their credit and overall financial health. Credit Karma was established to provide free credit scores and proved to be a hit: growing to over 85 million users by 2020.
Lin’s source of inspiration for a pro-consumer business model came from two former employers, Upromise and Eloan. Eloan was the first company to give out free credit scores before the now-ubiquitous subscription models. Upromise helps people save for college by offering a cash back rewards program. These companies helped shape Lin’s vision for Credit Karma to provide education about your credit, while giving free access to credit scores to all consumers. Prior to launching Credit Karma, Lin founded Multilytics Marketing, a data-driven marketing agency that actively managed more than $40 million a year in online marketing dollars for clients such as Wells Fargo, Liberty Mutual, and eBay. Lin holds a bachelor’s in mathematics and economics from Boston University.
28. Chris Britt
Company: Chime
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Founder
Chris Britt, the Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Chime, spearheads the enterprise that endeavors to transform financial tranquility into a tangible reality for countless individuals. Chime, a swiftly expanding financial technology firm in the United States, provides banking services that are both beneficial and effortlessly accessible, all without any charges. The organization's underlying ethos rests upon the principle of generating profits alongside its members, rather than extracting gains from them.
Before his tenure at Chime, Britt occupied the role of SVP of corporate development at Green Dot Corporation, preceded by his distinguished position as a senior product leader at Visa. Furthermore, his earlier professional experience encompasses a tenure as a management strategy consultant with Accenture. Britt completed his undergraduate studies in economics at Tulane University.
29. Scott Sanborn
Company: Lending Club
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Scott Sanborn is Chief Executive Officer of Lending Club, America's leading digital marketplace bank. He is also a member of the company’s board of directors. Since its launch in 2006, LendingClub has been at the forefront of revolutionizing the banking industry. By taking a traditional credit product, the installment loan, and making it accessible online, LendingClub has experienced rapid growth and success.
Since joining LendingClub in 2010, Sanborn has been a driving force in the management and development of the organization. With previous executive roles, including chief marketing officer, chief operations officer, and president, he has been instrumental in steering his company through a prolonged period of triple-digit growth. Prior to LendingClub, Sanborn held leadership positions – including chief revenue officer – for publicly-traded eHealthInsurance. Previously, he also served as president of RedEnvelope; and was SVP at the Home Shopping Network. He holds a Bachelor of Arts from Tufts University.
30. Mitchell Elegbe
Company: Interswitch
Title: Founder, Managing Director, and Chief Executive Officer
Mitchell Elegbe is the Founder, Managing Director, and Chief Executive Officer of Interswitch Group, an integrated payment processing company that operates in Africa. After its founding in 2002, the company operates from its headquarters in Lagos. Interswitch connects all the banks in Nigeria using switching technology. It makes sure that all the ATM cards are connected to its service function well.
Elegbe obtained his Bachelor of Engineering certificate from the University of Benin, Edo State (UNIBEN). He studied electrical engineering. He has also attended the Global CEO Program, which is jointly organized by IESE Business School, The Wharton School, and China Europe International Business School (CEIBS).
31. Tad Phelps
Company: Fintech
Title: Chief Executive Officer and President
As Chief Executive Officer and President of Fintech, Tad oversees all aspects of the company’s overall strategic priorities and is responsible for advancing Fintech’s position as a leading provider of technology, analytics, and data for the alcohol industry. For over 30 years, Fintech has led the charge to revolutionize operational efficiencies across the beverage alcohol industry.
Prior to Fintech, Phelps was with NCR for 16+ years, which included a stint of 4+ years as the vice president & global general manager for NCR’s Hospitality, Travel & Entertainment Divisions. Preceding this role, he had the following positions at Radiant Systems: vice president of the Americas; vice president of sales & marketing; and managing director of sales for North America. Before joining Radiant Systems, he spent 15 years in the food service industry with AFC Enterprises, General Mills, and PepsiCo Food Service. Phelps holds a Bachelor of Science in business administration from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
32. Philip Fayer
Company: Nuvei
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Chairman
Philip Fayer, the Founder of Nuvei, also currently serves as the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the company. Established in 2003, the Montreal-based payment processor has a client base that spans from e-commerce platforms to online casinos. Furthermore, Nuvei is capable of processing payments in more than 150 currencies.
Fayer received his education at Valley Forge Military Academy and College located in Pennsylvania. In 2003, while still a student at Concordia, he and co-founder Lester Hernandez started a payment processing company. It would become very successful immediately, and he would then leave Concordia before graduating. Fayer previously established and ran the successful company, Paysystems Corp. He secured partnerships with major international banks; and built a business that serviced over 23,000 Internet merchants and generated millions of dollars. In 2003, he also established Pivotal Payments, with the aim of making payment processing more accessible to small and mid-sized businesses.
33. Zachary Perret
Company: Plaid
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Zach Perret is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Plaid, the technology company powering the fintech ecosystem. Perret and his co-founder, William Hockey, launched Plaid in 2012 after learning firsthand the difficulties in trying to build and scale fintech applications. Plaid is a financial technology company that provides a platform connecting various financial institutions with users' bank accounts and financial data. Plaid offers a set of APIs and software tools that enable developers to build applications that securely access banking information, verify accounts, and initiate payments. By acting as an intermediary between financial institutions and third-party applications, Plaid simplifies the process of accessing and utilizing financial data, empowering developers to create innovative financial services and products.
Perret earned a bachelor’s in physics, chemistry, and biology from Duke University.
34. Krish Subramanian
Company: Chargebee
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Krish Subramanian is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Chargebee, a global unicorn in the subscription management industry. With over two decades of technology experience, Subramanian has transformed Chargebee from a bootstrapped start-up into a leading player in the market. His passion lies in problem-solving – particularly in customer-facing operations, pricing optimization, and the start-up landscape.
Founded in 2011, Chargebee offers a comprehensive subscription management platform that empowers businesses to automate and streamline recurring billing and subscription management processes. The platform enables businesses to create, manage, and optimize subscription plans, handle complex billing scenarios, and seamlessly integrate with various payment gateways and third-party applications. Before launching Chargebee, Subramanian started his career as a software engineer at MatexNet Pvt Ltd. He then held positions as a project manager at TCS; and a technology specialist at Cognizant Technology Solutions. Subramanian obtained his bachelor's from Bharathidasan University.
35. Tina Hodges
Company: Advance Financial
Title: Chief Executive and Chief Experience Officer
Tina Hodges is the Chief Executive and Chief Experience Officer of Advance Financial. She joined the company in 2000 as Vice President. Advance Financial is a leading fintech company based in Nashville, Tennessee. It employs over 1,000 team members across its 100+ stores in Tennessee and offers online services in 13 states.
Hodges earned an MSN from Vanderbilt University, an undergraduate degree in medical technology from Meharry Medical College, and undergraduate degrees in biology and chemistry from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
36. Amanda Eisel
Company: Zelis
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Amanda Eisel has focused the last 20 years of her career at the intersection of healthcare and technology. She has been deeply involved in creating and scaling multiple growth technology companies including Waystar, Applied Systems, and Viewpoint. Eisel has been a member of the Zelis team since 2019, playing a leadership role across Zelis’ growth, operational and talent strategies. Eisel started her career at McKinsey & Company, where she spent nearly a decade advising consumer companies. Prior to Zelis, Eisel was an operating partner at Bain Capital, where she focused on technology and healthcare IT companies.
Eisel is a member of the Board of Directors for two non-profit organizations: Youth Villages of Massachusetts and New Hampshire and Make-A-Wish Foundation of Massachusetts and Rhode Island. She is also on the Board of Directors of Rocket Software. She has a Bachelor of Science in commerce from the University of Virginia and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
37. Oliver Prill
Company: Tide
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Oliver Prill serves as the Chief Executive Officer of Tide, a prominent provider of SME business accounts, and one of the rapidly expanding fintech companies within the U.K. With an active presence in both the U.K. and India, Tide has amassed a substantial user base, boasting over 500,000 members in the U.K. and more than 50,000 in India. Tide's influence extends beyond mere provision of business accounts and related banking services, as its platform incorporates an extensive range of interconnected administrative tools tailored to meet the needs of enterprises
Prior to his tenure at Tide, Prill was a COO at Kreditech Holding and a CEO and advisor at Optanus. During earlier years, he worked with McKinsey & Companies as an associate senior engagement manager. Prill earned a doctorate in economics from the University of Oxford, a master’s in finance from the University of Cambridge, and an undergraduate degree in economics from University College London.
38. Scott Tynes
Company: Consero Global
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Scott Tynes is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Consero Global. Consero disrupts the way businesses build and maintain their finance and accounting function. Through a cloud-based platform, Consero delivers the financial clarity and efficiency needed to drive a business forward. Strategic CFOs are adopting Consero’s products to free up time and understand how businesses are performing.
Tynes has more than 20 years of direct finance and consulting experience with enterprises ranging in size from emerging technology businesses to Fortune 500 companies, including IBM. Prior to founding Consero, Tynes was director of finance at Trilogy Software, where he led efforts to build their off-shore finance team and led efforts to acquire and integrate over 15 acquisitions. Tynes holds an MBA from the University of Texas and a Bachelor of Arts in business from Rice University. Tynes also sits on the board of the Austin Technology Council, which is a non-profit organization focused on being the leading unifying voice for tech companies in Central Texas.
39. Lalit Keshre
Company: Groww
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Lalit Keshre is the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Groww. As CEO, Keshre looks after all the aspects of the business, predominantly the product and customer experience. Groww is an Indian-based online investment platform that allows individuals to invest in a wide range of financial instruments: mutual funds, stocks, exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and gold. The platform offers a seamless and paperless onboarding process, allowing users to open an account and start investing within minutes.
Before starting Groww, Keshre was in a senior product management role at Flipkart, where he launched and led Flipkart Quick; and helped launch Flipkart Marketplace. Earlier, Keshre founded an online learning company called Eduflix, and he has also been an early team member at Ittiam Systems. Keshre is an alumnus of IIT Bombay.
40. Larry Diamond
Company: Zip
Title: Global Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
In 2013, Larry Diamond co-founded Zip with Peter Gray. Their goal was to disrupt the conventional credit card model by using technology to create a transparent, fairer, and more flexible alternative. Taking the company helm as Global CEO, Diamond has helped lead his company from a fintech start-up to one of Australia's leading digital payment companies. In fact, today Zip is an ASX200-listed company – and a leading global BNPL player that operates across 14 countries. It services tens of thousands of merchants and millions of customers worldwide.
Prior to Zip, Diamond spent over 12 years working in retail, technology and investment banking, where he held leadership roles at Pacific Brands and Deutsche Bank. He also spent time at Macquarie Capital, where he first saw the opportunity to digitize financial services with innovative products that bring customers and merchants together. Diamond has a Master of Commerce from The University of New South Wales and a Bachelor of Technology from the University of Technology, Sydney.
41. Chen Amit
Company: Tipalti
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Chen Amit, the Chief Executive Officer of Tipalti, joined the company in 2010. Tipalti stands out as the singular global payables automation solution that effectively streamlines every phase of the accounts payable (AP) and payment management workflow within a comprehensive cloud platform. With Tipalti, managing the entire supplier payments operation becomes effortless for accounts payable departments. This solution encompasses various aspects, including supplier onboarding and vetting, tax and regulatory compliance, invoice processing, payments to suppliers worldwide using diverse payment methods and currencies, communication of supplier payment status, and concluding the process with payment reconciliation and reporting.
Prior to his position at Tipalti, Amit served as the CEO of Atrica. He also previously held the role of general manager at ECI Telecom earlier in his career. He earned a Bachelor of Science from the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, and an MBA from INSEAD.
42. Harshvardhan Lunia
Company: Lendingkart
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Harshvardhan Lunia is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Lendingkart, one of the most popular fintech start-ups in India. As an entrepreneur, Lunia’s journey with Lendingkart started back in 2014, when he wanted to provide quick loans to small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) and help them grow their business. Since then, Lendingkart has grown to become one of the top players in this field. In the past few years, Lunia’s company has raised more than $200 million dollars of funding.
Early on, Lunia studied at the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, and after passing, he became a chartered accountant back in 2003. After that, he again studied at the Indian School of Business and completed his course in 2008. He later joined HDFC Bank as a small business relationship manager, working there for about a year. Then he decided to move to Standard Chartered Bank, where he served as city manager for about two and a half years. After that, he again became a relationship manager at ICICI Bank for two years. Additionally, in 2010, he founded his own company: Domestic Finance & Investment Private Limited.
43. Alexandre Prot
Company: Qonto
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Alexandre Prot serves as the Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Qonto, a prominent European business finance solution. Qonto streamlines various aspects of financial management, encompassing everyday banking, financing, bookkeeping, and spending management while ensuring the secure organization of all business banking and finance requirements. Qonto provides an array of services including business accounts and cards, invoice management, expense and spend management, as well as bookkeeping and reporting. It holds TÜV certification for software quality and has been honored with the Fintech Germany award twice, in addition to securing the first position in the German B2B award.
Prior to his tenure at Qonto, Prot was already an established entrepreneur. He co-founded Smartven and was the founder of Smokio. Early on, he commenced his professional journey as an associate at McKinsey & Company. Prot holds three degrees. He received an MBA from INSEAD, a master's in finance from HEC Paris, and an undergraduate degree from Lycee Henri IV.
44. Eric Friedrichsen
Company: Emburse
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Board Director
Eric Friedrichsen is the Chief Executive Officer of Emburse, a modern spend management company with a growing portfolio of solutions that revolutionize the way organizations manage employee expenses, process invoices and make payments. Emburse eliminates manual, time-consuming tasks so business travelers, finance professionals and CFOs can focus on what really matters — their community, family, and more rewarding work.
Friedrichsen has 30 years of experience driving growth for software companies. Prior to Emburse, he was the global head of commercial, SMB, and growth markets for Marketo, a division of Adobe. Before joining Marketo, he was SVP and general manager for SAP’s North American mid-market and ecosystems division. Earlier in his career, Friedrichsen had sales, technical, and general management leadership positions at SAP Concur, Business Objects, and Information Builders. Friedrichsen earned an undergraduate degree in management information systems from the University of Iowa.
45. Lisa Jacobs
Company: Funding Circle
Title: Chief Executive Officer
Lisa Jacobs is the Chief Executive Officer of Funding Circle. In this role, she is responsible for driving the company’s strategy and overseeing her company’s operations in the U.K. and the U.S. Jacobs has been with her company since 2012, and previously served as the U.K. managing director. In addition, she previously held the role of Funding Circle’s chief strategy officer, where she was responsible for developing and launching new product propositions and incubating new business areas. Launched in 2010, the company offers small businesses the lending hand they need to go further. Funding Circle delivers a fast, hassle-free experience for small businesses looking for finance.
Prior to her time at Funding Circle, Jacobs worked as a consultant, both independently and for the Boston Consulting Group. Over the course of her career, she has advised national and multinational companies – from a variety of industries – on strategic and operational initiatives aimed at creating growth and transformation. On top of that, Jacobs has worked for NGOs in Tanzania and India. She received a first-class degree in PPE (philosophy, politics, and economics) from the University of Oxford.
46. Islam Shawky
Company: Paymob
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Islam Shawky is a Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer for Paymob, a company that enables businesses to accept both online and offline payments through an innovative mobile wallet technology that provides clients with access to finance and digital payments. The start-up’s undeniable recent success has established Shawky as a central player in Africa’s fintech space. As CEO, he has grown Paymob into a payments giant that processes millions of transactions and billions of dollars each year.
Shawky started his career during his university studies in Cairo, Egypt. In addition to his duties at Paymob, he is also a member of the Board of Trustees for the Technology Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center; and is passionate about building innovative large-scale technologies to empower the masses to access financial services. Shawky holds a Bachelor of Science in engineering from The American University in Cairo
47. Mike Massaro
Company: Flywire
Title: Chief Executive Officer
As Chief Executive Officer of Flywire, Mike Massaro has grown the business from a concept into a global powerhouse and publicly-traded company. Over the years, Massaro has overseen Flywire’s expansion in North America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific regions – while aligning his company’s international team with its strategic direction.
Massaro began his career as part of the technical risk services practice at PWC. His background spans global payments, mobile software, mobile hardware, and e-billing at high growth technology companies like Carrier IQ and edocs, Inc. He earned his Bachelor of Science in management information systems from Babson College.
48. Prajit Nanu
Company: Nium
Title: Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Singapore-headquartered cross-border payments company has seen substantial growth since its 2014 launch. Today, as Chief Executive Officer, Prajit Nanu leads all aspects of the company’s strategy. This includes expanding the breadth, depth, speed, and reach of Nium; and thus creating more ways for money to move as efficiently as possible. Currently, the company’s payout network supports 100 currencies and spans 190+ countries. As of February of 2022, the Nium’s value was estimated to be $2 billion.
Prior to co-founding Nium, Nanu held leadership positions in various global organizations. He was the global sales director at TMF Group, a multinational professional services firm headquartered in Amsterdam. He also served as the VP of sales and account management at WNS Global Services, a business process management company. Nanu earned his undergraduate degree in economics from University of Mumbai.
49. Kevin Coop
Company: DailyPay
Title: Chief Executive Officer
In June 2022 Kevin Coop was named Chief Executive Officer of DailyPay. `A boon for investors, Coop brings three decades of experience running operations, driving growth, and sustaining profitability at companies of various sizes and stages. Most recently, he served as president of North America at Dun & Bradstreet (DNB), where he was responsible for profitability and growth of North America across all product lines and businesses. After joining DNB as part of the leadership team that led the privatization in 2019 – and return to the public markets in 2020 – Coop held positions overseeing global revenue, commercial operations, and enterprise commercial technology.
Over the course of his career, Coop has helped lead several successful IPOs, including at DNB, Black Knight, Verisk, Move, and Premenos. Prior to joining DNB, he led the data and analytics businesses for Black Knight. Before that, Coop was group president of the financial services businesses of Verisk, where he spent more than a decade. Coop graduated from University of California with a bachelor’s in history and political science.
50. Mike Tuchen
Company: Onfido
Title: Chief Executive Officer
In 2020 Mike Tuchen joined Onfido as Chief Executive Officer. Launched in 2012, Onfido makes it easy for people to access services by digitally verifying them via its real identity platform. The company’s exclusive platform allows businesses to tailor verification methods to individual user and market needs in a no-code, orchestration layer – combining the right mix of document and biometric verifications, trusted data sources, and passive fraud signals.
Prior to Onfido, Tuchen spent nearly a decade at Talend, a global provider of data integration and data management. During this time at Talend, he rose to CEO, holding the position for more than six years. Previously, Tuchen also served as general manager of Microsoft’s SQL Server Marketing team, where he helped grow the SQL business from $1.5 billion to $2.5 billion. Earlier in his career, he joined Microsoft as a member of the MSN team, and became an early evangelist of the Internet and MSN’s first Internet marketing manager. His other major roles include serving as general manager for Polycom’s Austin division, a $190 million videoconferencing equipment business. He also co-founded and was chief operating officer of Paramark, a marketing analytics startup. Tuchen began his career at Sun Microsystems, working as an engineer on Sun’s SPARC workstations. In addition, Tuchen’s educational credentials are exemplary. He holds a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from Brown University, a Master of Science in electrical engineering from Stanford University, and an MBA from Harvard Business School, where he was a Baker Scholar.
