The Kunai Podcast: Fintech is Eating the World

In today’s episode, Tarun Bhasin, CEO of Kunai, gets together with Nan Siler, Head of Payment Operations at Finix. Nan reflects on her initial experience with Finix as a customer and why she was so impressed with their services. Gain special insight into how Finix is structured and how they deliver exceptional payment operations. Next, we take a deeper look at payment operations and why it’s such a challenging part of the payment system to execute seamlessly and effectively. Nan draws on her immense knowledge to explain the technical complexities inherent to payment operations. We also discuss the technological advancements in the field of payments over the past twenty years and how small businesses have gained access to affordable services that were previously limited to large companies. 

Key Points From This Episode:

• Get to know today’s guest, Nan Siler, and how she came to be Head of Payment Operations at Finix.
• How Nan first encountered Finix as a customer.
• An overview of Finix’s service and operations and why it's a great option for customers.
• A deeper look at payment operations and why it’s such a challenging part of the payment system to execute seamlessly and effectively.
• Why it’s necessary to have a payments operations team to optimize your payment system.
• The role of a payments facilitator in your payments system.
• Daily transaction-level reconciliations and why it’s an important part of payment operations.
• How payment operations teams are hampered by a lack of access to data and being bound to antiquated processes.
• Some of the advancements in payments technology that Nan has noticed from working in the industry for over two decades.
• How small businesses have gained access to payments technology that was previously unavailable to them.
• What large companies can learn from leaner startups.
• How Finix positions itself in an increasingly competitive market.
• The four primary approaches to payment management and how they differ.
• Why it’s ideal to do as little migrating as possible.
• Why platforms are the future for small businesses.
• Nan’s views on Buy Now, Pay Later and why she defines it as generational.

Tweetables:

“I believe that large companies can definitely learn from leaner startups. However, I'm just not sure they can execute at the speed required to keep up.” — Nan Siler [00:12:47]

“Finix’s mission is to create the most accessible financial services ecosystem in history starting with payments.” — Nan Siler [00:13:39]

“The good news is at Finix, we're lowering the barrier to entry to most of those controlled payment experiences.” — Nan Siler [0:17:56]

“Platforms are the future for small businesses. They enable the small business to have that back-office experience of a large ERP system without all the pain and expense associated with those implementations.” — Nan Siler [0:20:46]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Nan Siler on LinkedIn

Kabbage

Finix

American Express

ACI Worldwide

Tarun Bhasin

Kunai

In today’s episode Tarun Bhasin, CEO of Kunai is joined by Brad Kelly, Managing Director at Payment Services. We continue the conversation on the ubiquity of FinTech and discuss various facets of buy now, pay later (BNPL) and how it will affect the current market, both in America and Australia. Brad lends his expertise to the phenomenon of BNPL, interrogates its role in the Australian banking system, and reflects on the regulatory challenges it will likely face with conservative banks in the not too distant future.

Key Points From This Episode:

• Introducing today’s guest Brad Kelly, Managing Director of Payment Services, and our host Tarun Bhasin, CEO of Kunai.
• An overview of the Australian banking and customer market today, and what the future holds.
• How the Pareto principle is evident in Australian banking.
• How banks use the data provided by the Australian reserve bank every month.
• The considerable growth of debit cards in Australia and how citizens are changing their spending habits.
• How Afterpay works and why it’s not necessarily as profitable as it presents itself to be.
• A discussion of BNPL and its presence in Sydney, Australia as well as Apple’s potential plans for it in the United States.
• PayPal’s presence in Australia and how their transaction fees are structured.
• The strategies that Afterpay is using to target Millennials.
• Why Qantas is a serious player in the financial services market, and how they demonstrate that credit cards will continue to grow and be popular. 
• Why Starbucks initially fared very poorly in Australia and how they were eventually able to find a market with American tourists.
• How digital wallets differ in Australia and America.
• Why buy now, pay later cards are limited in their revenue potential.
• How the different regulations around credit in Australia and America affects average spending habits.

Tweetables:

“Basically, you can apply this 80-20 Pareto principle to all Australian banking, and they've successfully watered off just about every challenge that's ever come at them. The ones that have, they buy them. That’s pretty much how it works.” — Brad Kelly [0:02:05]

“Australia has a couple of unique quirks besides killer spiders and snakes and people called Hemsworth. What we've got is a very strong banking system, but we've got this indigenous debit payment network called EFTPOS, and it’s been around for about 45 years.” — Brad Kelly [0:04:14]

“So the Citibank model, for instance, which is a virtual card in a wallet, and it runs on MasterCard rails. So what that means is it just behaves like a standard card or the point of sale. There's nothing tricky necessarily about it. ” — Brad Kelly [0:11:15]

“I think the real risk for Afterpay and their cohorts is the risk of regulation.” — Brad Kelly [0:33:52]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Brad Kelly on LinkedIn

Tarun Bhasin

Kunai

Sniip

AfterPay

Marqeta

PayPal

[02:12] Siavash’s education background

[03:43] Becoming a refugee overnight

[07:34] Siavash’s initial telecom roles

[16:10] Decentralizing communications

[20:03] Cloud

[24:37] Blockchain

[29:58] Digital assets versus monetary assets

[39:47] The mission at Wells Fargo

[43:00] Determining success

[46:42] Pushing the boundaries of large organizations

LinkedIn

Website

Mimik

Website

[01:51] Bojan’s backstory

[07:50] Being agile and adapting

[13:43] Big Data

[18:53] Data engineering in the gym

[22:55] Data cleansing, grooming, and ethics

[30:12] Open data, open source

[38:34] Bojan’s final thoughts

LinkedIn

Website

Website

[01:33] Working at Plaid

[11:10] Expanding the team to NYC

[13:42] Visa and 2020

[15:16] Where does the money meet the road?

[19:16] Blockchain and DeFi

[23:07] The ultimate goal at Ramp

[27:52] Alloy and identity

LinkedIn

Twitter

Website

Alloy.com

Website

[01:58] Diana’s background

[04:01] Creativity and FinTech

[06:40] Diana at Mollie

[09:32] Identifying the features

[11:37] APIs or front-end application?

[13:28] Managing a growing group over time

[16:55] Was Covid a feature or scalability challenge, or both?

[22:35] Going forward

LinkedIn

Website

Website

In this conversation with Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann, Founding Member of RMK Group, LLC, she talks about making tough decisions, the increasingly rapid change in industries, and the benefits of living in San Francisco. Hear about Rebecca’s experience as a leader, and her new book, Fit CEO.

[01:48] Tough choices

[08:05] How should banks approach a rapidly changing environment?

[11:27] The benefits of San Francisco

[15:35] Rebecca’s Fit CEO book

LinkedIn

Fit CEO Website

RMK Group LLC Website

Website

[01:12] Chad’s background

[03:34] Getting into startups

[05:23] Getting into Fintech

[06:23] Platform-based vs coin cryptocurrency

[07:47] Shifting from crypto to corporate

[10:05] LaunchPad

[11:14] The drive towards platform

[14:41] Chad’s team successes

[17:50] Overcoming hurdles

[20:35] Shaping user engagement

[26:16] Looking forward

[27:37] API to platform

[29:57] How does decentralization play a role with LaaS?

[32:57] MasterCard partnering with Bahamas Sand Dollar

[34:53] Digital assets

[35:59] Shameless plug for Mastercard

LinkedIn

Twitter

Website

[01:24] Becky’s background

[05:03] Capital One business partners

[06:27] Customer centricity

[07:51] Thinking about change

[10:08] Growing a team from 30 to 500

[13:02] Creating customer alignment

[17:28] Separating the physical and the digital

[20:04] Leading UX design teams

[23:03] How did brand become so important?

[26:49] Becky’s new role

[30:17] Closing thoughts

LinkedIn

[01:56] Banmeet’s career arc

[12:06] How has servicing changed over time?

[17:41] Creating relevant experiences for customers

[21:01] Curating experiences across different technologies

[24:06] Identifying pain points

[32:27] Call centers and FinTech

LinkedIn

Website