SPEAKER PROFILES
Robert Courtneidge
Industry Expert
Robert was appointed CEO of international payments business Moorwand Limited following a distinguished career in the card and payments industry. For the past six years, he has been named in the Payments Power 10 (including being ranked #1 in 2015), a highly competitive ranking of the most influential contributors in payments. Robert has deep expertise in e-money, and is highly skilled in all aspects of consumer finance issues, including consumer protection, banking regulation and compliance and anti-money laundering.
In the UK, he works closely with The Payments Services Regulator, HM Treasury and Financial Conduct Association, and other compliance and industry bodies globally. He is also currently Non Executive Board Director/Strategic Advisor to over 15 diverse payment and payment related companies. Previously, Robert achieved success as a senior legal professional specialising in matters relating to cards and payments. He regularly speaks on issues facing the European Payments' Industry including laws relating to Blockchain, Cryptocurrencies and Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs).
Peter Oakes
Founder and Mentor at Fintech UK & Fintech Ireland
Peter is recognised by Chambers & Partners as a Band 1 Leading Fintech Consultant. He is an active non-executive director and advisor on board of regulated fintech and regtech including TransferMate Global Payments, AWM Wealth Advisers, Susquehanna International, Optal Financial and the Mizen Group in roles including Chairman and Member of Audit & Risk Committees.
He is the Founder of CompliReg, a fintech advisory firm and Founder of the FintechIreland.com and FintechUK.com Networks. Peter was appointed as the first Director of Enforcement & AML in Ireland at the Central Bank following the financial crisis and has held senior roles with the UK FSA, the Australian Securities & Investments Commission and Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority. His industry roles include setting up Bank of America Merchant Services’s fintech & payment operations in Europe, where his was a board director and Chief Risk Officer.
Peter is a lawyer, qualified in the UK, Ireland and Australia and is a strategic consultant to Kerman & Co (UK law firm) and Clark Hill (Ireland law firm).
Peter is an International presenter, speaker & media commentator on fintech, regtech, risk and governance having presented before > 9,000 professionals. Contact him at peter@peteroakes.com for speaking engagements.
Ritesh Jain
Ritesh Jain, COO, CTO, former Global Head of Digital Technology at HSBC
Ritesh is a tech enthusiast, IT executive & Board Advisor, with an entrepreneurial spirit, Diversity & Inclusion advocate with 2 decades of global experience in Digital Technology, Business Transformation, and Operations, He has led milestone changes in Financial Services, Fin-tech, Shipping, Telecom and Government, and led the future of payments for VISA and delivered Apple Pay in Europe. Through the course of professional life, Ritesh was involved in building and leading the digital CoE at Maersk, whilst leading recovery from the biggest ransomware (Not Petya) incident in the industry. recently he was engaged in building enabling functions to build The Bank of The Future with HSBC. Ritesh comes from an entrepreneurial background, with experience in building & mentoring successful businesses, He provides technical expertise and advice to Parliamentary Digital Service in the UK and is an advisor for payment regulatory as well as other Governments.
Angela Johnson de Wet
Head of Risk for IT Change and New Technologies at Lloyds Banking Group
Prior to working at Lloyds, Angela worked At Deutsche Bank in the Cloud, Anti-Financial Crime Analytics, Data Quality and Finance Risk and Regulatory Reporting change and transformation teams. Before joining Deutsche Bank, Angela worked as a Senior Manager at EY across Asia Pacific and EMEIA within the Financial Services Organisation focusing on Corporate Banking and Capital Markets transformation and advisory programmes. Angela started her career at IBM in Australia working as a developer, tester, designer and then business analyst and project manager.
Angela has an honours degree in Mechanical Engineering (Mechatronics / Robotics) and Computer Science from the University of Melbourne, Australia.
Pedro de Sousa Avelino
Chief Information Officer at NN Insurance
Pedro is the Chief Information Officer of NN Hungary and acting as a thoughtful leader in the Central European markets, he constantly challenges the status quo of the Financial Services and Insurance industries, reshaping outdated operating models so that companies can fully realize a digital-first delivery mindset and disrupt their markets by bringing their customers and their employees at the center.
Before joining NN (Nationale-Nederlanden) Insurance International, Pedro worked for more than 10 years in the Telecommunications industry in several roles providing state of the art services for the top Mobile Network Operators throughout the world and this experience in an industry that has an unparallel pace such as Telecom, allows him to enable Banks and Insurers with ideas, and execution strategies, that pave their way through their digital transformation journeys while being successful at it.
Amit Varma
Executive Director, Country Technology Head at DBS Bank
Senior Executive & visionary technology leader with a strong track-record of strategy creation & execution, technology innovation, product/ solution engineering, talent growth/empowerment, digital/ IT transformation and delivery excellence. Through thought leadership, IT strategy formulation, product roadmap development, technology innovation, planning and flawless execution, Amit has delivered award-winning software products, solutions & services, thereby leading to significant new business revenue & efficiency gains.
Over 22+ years, Amit has pioneered technology innovation & product development based on Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, Cloud, Big Data, Machine Learning, Cryptocurrency, Microservices, Biometric Digital Security, Web & e-Commerce technology. Amit is an excellent organisation-builder and team-nurturer, who thrives at the opportunity to build & grow organisations/teams and to mentor, guide the talent and goals’ fulfilment of his team-members.
With a passion for IT transformation/ continuous improvement & strong expertise in Agile, DevOps, Design Thinking, CMMI & ISO practices, Amit has established greenfield sites and reinvented brownfield IT ecosystems for large-scale/ start-up Financial Services, Banking and Telecom firms.
Konstantinos (Kostas) Perifanos
ex. Director, Machine Learning at OakNorth
Konstantinos Perifanos has joined OakNorth in 2019 as a Director of Machine Learning. Prior to OanNorth, he worked at Sainsbury's Argos, Royal Mail, Pearson and in research; he was involved in a broad range of projects from European Research programs to FinTech, Logistics, Retail using Machine Learning and AI. He is interested in Deep Learning, Optimisation, and Natural Language Processing.
Sergio Magalhães
Director of the Digital Transformation Office at Bank Millenium
Sergio Magalhães has more than 20 years of experience leading development teams and IT Departments in MillenniumBCP, a multinational bank, based in Portugal which is leader in innovation and customer experience. Since 2015 he is the Head of the Branch of The Future Department that is responsible for Branch Transformation projects, connecting the physical and the digital worlds, delivering the best customer experience. He oversaw the development of a new customer-oriented branch concept, now present in more than 40 locations in Portugal and with innovation features available in all 600+ branches of Millennium bcp in Portugal. In 2018 he assumes the role of Director in the Digital transformation Office of Millennium BCP. Today is responsible for the Application development of all the channels in Millennium BCP.
Bharat Bhushan
CTO - Banking and Financial Markets Europe at IBM
Bharat is leading the charge in helping IBM's clients in the Banking and Financial Markets industries leverage digital technology to transform by creating engaging platforms, and streamlining business operations. As the CTO for the Banking and Financial Markets, he is responsible for establishing and executing IBM's strategy for Banking and Financial markets for Europe. In this spearhead role, he drives innovation agenda with my customers and creates solutions using all of IBM's capabilities including research and external partners and FinTech relationships.
Bharat champions open technology, customer experience and security. He forms IBM's points of view on critical matters - Bank of the Future, Payments Architecture, PSD2, OpenBanking, MiFID II, for example. He helps his clients understand what these initiatives may mean from a business, operations and IT perspectives. Bharat maintains a start-up mentality and incubates innovative and creative ideas with a vision of driving business and industry disruption.
Elie Beyrouthy
Vice President, European Government Affairs at American Express; Chair of the Executive Board at European Payment Institutions Federation (EPIF)
Elie Beyrouthy is Vice President of European Government Affairs at American Express since June 2017 where he leads the company’s engagement with European Union Institutions and advises senior leaders on EU regulatory and public policy matters. Elie also represents American Express’ interests in several EU trade bodies and professional associations. Since March 2018, Elie is Chair of the European Payment Institutions Federation (EPIF). Prior to joining American Express, Elie was Director of International Regulatory Affairs at Western Union for 5 years. From 2007 to 2012, Elie held leadership positions at the World Savings Banks Institute and the European Banking Federation.
Elie began his career as an intern at the European Commission and the United States Federal District Court of Minnesota. He holds two Masters Degrees in Law from the University of Minnesota and from the Jean Moulin University in Lyon - France. Elie is also a graduate of the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Lyon, France.
Denisa Jindřichová
Senior Legal Counsel, Licensing and Enforcement Department at Czech National Bank
Skills proven by the successful and long lasting experience in different legal areas with emphasis on payments, cash legislation, cybersecurity and consumer protection in the area of credits (MCD). These activities include drafting of the brand new legislation, amendments of existing legislation, and legal interpretation of different problems. Among other activities it is possible to count coordination of co-operation of the CNB on the EU level, cooperation with the Czech Banking Association and other non-banking industry associations, with the Ministry of Finance, etc.
Developments of new methods of payments like so called innovative, mobile payments and rules of cybersecurity etc. Regulation and licensing process of FinTech.The member of Remonstrance Committee of the Ministry of Finance.
Milan Kuveljic
Head of Quality Engineering at N26 Group
Milan is a Head of Quality Engineering and at N26, the mobile first world bank. He has started as a Software Test Consultant where he was helping development teams in large organizations in banking and insurance domain to establish automation in testing culture. Later on, he has moved to Berlin to work on quality and reliability improvements in challenging Ad tech space. In the last decade he has gained practical experience in software testing and quality assurance, in particular, agile testing, automation in testing and tooling, which he is sharing with engineering teams to improve the quality and process of building software. He strongly believes people are the most important aspect in software development, thus in terms of agile, he has worked with many engineers, coaches and product owners and helped them to grow both technically and personally. He enjoys speaking publicly at the conferences and meetups where he shares his knowledge and experience.
Emilios Markou
Co-Founder and Executive Director at Hellas Direct
Emilios is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of Hellas Direct. Hellas Direct is a digital-first, full- stack insurance company, empowered by cutting-edge technology and artificial intelligence. Founded in 2011, the company aims to revolutionize the insurance value chain by adopting an extreme focus on operational excellence. Prior to Hellas Direct, Emilios was a Director in the European Financial Institutions Structuring team at Barclays Capital. Before that, he was an Executive Director at the Goldman Sachs Investment Banking Division where he led a number of projects within the firm’s European insurance practice. A former strategy consultant with McKinsey & Company, Emilios advised a number of European, US and Asian clients on numerous strategic issues in insurance, banking, energy and transportation. Over the past few years, Emilios has privately invested in a number of different ventures, focusing on angel financing and the strategic use of technology in the financial services and healthcare space. He has held advisory roles and participated at Board level across a number of different start-up companies. Emilios graduated with a BSc(Hons) in Computer Science from the University of Manchester, an MSc in Actuarial Science from City University and an MSc in Finance from London Business School. Emilios is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries (FIA) in the United Kingdom and an Endeavor Global Entrepreneur.
Peter Thomas
Head of Data Innovation at Bank of England
Peter leads on data innovation in the regulatory arm of the Bank of England. He heads up a team of data specialists responsible for delivering the bank’s RegTech strategy, helping end users find, fix and explore new ways of using data and coordinating information and data governance.
Peter has worked in central banking and financial regulation since 2010. He has held roles in
insurance and banking policy, supervision and financial stability. In the latter Peter led the project to
bring CRD IV regulatory reporting data systems into the Bank of England.
Vishalanand Shah
Director – Application Systems and Head of PRIME Production Management at Global Payments, TSYS
Vishalanand holds 22+ years of experience in payments and transactions industry. His has niche knowledge on banking industry, payment scheme, digital innovations and data modeling arena. He holds deep experience on management of large scale projects, service managements methodologies, and people management skills. Banks and customers across Europe, LATAM, ISEA, MEA and CIS have received his expert services. Vishalanand is a vegetarian foodie and loves tracking, gardening.
Harry Xenophontos
Head of Acquiring & Digital Payment Services at
RCB BANK LTD
A business professional with over 15 years of professional experience in Management Consulting, IT and Risk related services; including pragmatic senior management experience within the Banking and Card Services corporate environments.
A “Big 4” background that drives professional attitude and quality driven results. A leader with excellent people skills and very well known in the consulting environment and payments industry locally.
Passionate of the emerging innovation and transformation of the financial services industry, looking to empower the consumer payment experience and services, towards a better digital economy.