Best Startup
At Best Startup UK we track over 130,000 UK startups and over 500,000 people who hold key positions in these companies. We use this directory of startups to highlight top employees, founders and board members we think deserve more appreciation than they are currently getting.
This list showcases the top United Kingdom based Director operating in the Mobile Payments space. If you think a Director is missing from this list, feel free to contact our editor on editor@beststartup.co.uk.
The individuals on this list have been included because of exceptional performance in one of the following categories:
- Innovation – Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth – Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management – Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact – Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data – We source our data from OSINT (open source intelligence) and public directories such as Companies House UK, Crunchbase, SemRush and many more. The data from these sources should be treated with a degree of caution and verified yourself.
Smriti Vicari
Exec Director, Business Strategy, Europe FinTech of Visa
Smriti Vicari is the Head of Fintech at Visa Europe. She oversees Fintech engagement, strategy and delivery activities, ensuring that Visa remains partner-of-choice for Fintechs, platforms and intermediaries. Smriti joined Visa in 2011, initially working in the Strategy team and then forming and leading the CEO Office. Prior to Visa, Smriti held a variety of roles in the US and UK financial services sectors. She began her career as an analyst in a US-based private equity fund-of-funds, where she analysed and recommended investments to multi-billion dollar pension funds, representing some of the largest institutional investors in the country. She then went onto lead a team of analysts at Moody’s Investors Service, assessing credit and investment risk within the Structured Finance group. Smriti held strategy and executive office roles at State Street Bank in London before joining Visa. Smriti holds a Bachelor’s degree in Business from the University of Southern California, and an MBA from London Business School.
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About Visa: Visa is a multinational financial services company that facilitates electronic payment systems throughout the world.
Mark Pettit
Executive Director, Innovation & Strategic Partnerships of Visa
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About Visa: Visa is a multinational financial services company that facilitates electronic payment systems throughout the world.
Jan Farrarons
Founder & Director of Judopay
Jan Farrarons is the founder of Dojo, Capital On Tap, and Judopay.
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About Capital on Tap, Dojo, Judopay: Judopay is a mobile-first payments platform.
Catherine Wines
Executive Director & Co-Founder of Zepz
Catherine is a qualified accountant with public company board experience and extensive commercial experience in the money transfer industry. Previously she was the Managing Director of First Remit, an international money transfer business subsequently acquired by Travelex Money Transfer where she became the Regional Director for UK, Ireland and Benelux as well as Operations Director. Catherine was one of the founding team members of WorldRemit.
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About Beam, Cambridge Judge Business School, Zepz: Zepz is a money transfer service that helps migrants send money to their loved ones all over the world.
Alix Murphy
Director of Mobile Partnerships of Zepz
Alix Murphy A leading Mobile Money specialist, Alix helps build and support commercial relationships with telecoms operators all over the world. Before WorldRemit, Alix was at the GSMA, where she consulted mobile operators on revenue opportunities in Mobile Money and digital identity. She has on-the-ground expertise of the telecoms sector in regions as diverse as sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, North America, East Asia and South East Asia. In her early career, Alix spent several years in international development, including at the Grameen Foundation and Aga Khan Foundation.
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About Zepz: Zepz is a money transfer service that helps migrants send money to their loved ones all over the world.
Adriana Marques
Managing Director, Europe and Global Network of Zepz
Adriana Marques is responsible for growing WorldRemit’s business in the European region as well as driving the expansion of the network globally by integrating new pay out partners, and launching money transfer services in new geographies. Adriana has over 20 years of experience in leading and developing teams, having previously held senior strategy and business development roles at Sodexo and American Express. Prior to joining WorldRemit in October 2017, Adriana served as Head of Merchant and VAS at Samsung launching Samsung Pay in the UK. Adriana holds an MBA from London Business School and a BA in Economics from Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Brazil.
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About Zepz: Zepz is a money transfer service that helps migrants send money to their loved ones all over the world.
Costas Frangeskou
Director of Sales of Goodlord
Costas brings more than 14 years experience in the property industry to Goodlord. This includes over a decade with Rightmove, where he held positions including National Sales Director and Commercial Operations Director.
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About Goodlord: Goodlord offers a cloud-based software to help estate agents, landlords, and tenants manage the rental process.
Matt Chatters
Finance Director of Goodlord
Goodlord’s resident Kiwi Matt has worked in London since 2013 at a number of exciting start-ups, and he has a particularly keen interest in the subscription-based SaaS business model. Away from Goodlord he enjoys travel, cycling, talking about how great New Zealand is, and being cannon fodder in PUBG.
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About Goodlord: Goodlord offers a cloud-based software to help estate agents, landlords, and tenants manage the rental process.
Daniel Cox
Financial Director of Fingopay
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About Fingopay: Identity authentication platform
Julian Colls
Customer Success Director of Form3
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About Form3: Form3 is a cloud native payments-as-a-service platform that designs, builds, and runs the technology that powers the future of payments.
Damien Byrne
Business Development Director of Boku
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About Boku: Boku is a global mobile payments network providing mobile-enhanced payments in e-commerce and at physical point-of-sale.
Alex Sladen
Marketing Director of Western Union
Alex Sladen is the Marketing Director of Western Union.
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About Western Union: Western Union provides consumers and businesses with fast, reliable and convenient ways to send and receive money around the world.
Thomas Leitch
Director of Sales – Treasury of Bottomline Technologies
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About Bottomline Technologies: Bottomline Technologies provides corporations, financial institutions, and banks with e-payment, invoice, and document automation solutions.
Marcus Hughes
Director of Business Development of Bottomline Technologies
Marcus Hughes serves as the Director of Business Development at Bottomline Technologies.
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About Bottomline Technologies: Bottomline Technologies provides corporations, financial institutions, and banks with e-payment, invoice, and document automation solutions.
Andy Walker
Marketing & Operations Director & Founding Member of Yumpingo
Andy Walker is a Marketing Director at Yumpingo.
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About Yumpingo: Yumpingo is an internet company that specializes in customer engagement and analytics platforms designed for the Hospitality Industry.
Cyrus Wadia
Payment Strategy Director & Co-Founder of Modulr
Cyrus Wadia is the Co-Founder and Payment Strategy Director of Modulr.
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About Modulr: Modulr is a fintech company that provides Payments as a Service API for digital businesses.
Gloria Benson
Director of Consult Hyperion
Gloria is a Director of Consult Hyperion who, prior to joining Consult Hyperion in 1987, has worked for a range of companies dealing with business administration and human resource management. She graduated with a Management MBA from City University Business School. Gloria brings a wealth of business and people knowledge to Consult Hyperion, having had many years experience in the IT industry. Gloria also represents the social commitment of Consult Hyperion to the local and wider community, and is Chair of the Industrial Advisory Board at the Department of Computing at the University of Surrey, where she has been a member of the Board for nearly 10 years and is now a Visiting Professor.
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About Consult Hyperion: Consult Hyperion is an independent strategic and technical consultancy.
David Birch
Director of Consult Hyperion
David G.W Birch is Director of Consult Hyperion, the secure electronic transactions consultancy. He is an internationally-recognised thought leader in digital identity and digital money; named one of the global top 15 favourite sources of business information (Wired magazine) and one of the top ten most influential voices in banking (Financial Brand); listed in the top 10 Twitter accounts followed by innovators, along with Bill Gates and Richard Branson (PR Daily); named one of the “Fintech Titans” (NextBank), voted one of the European “Power 50” people in digital financial services (FinTech Awards) and ranked Europe’s most influential commentator on emerging payments (Total Payments magazine).
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About Consult Hyperion: Consult Hyperion is an independent strategic and technical consultancy.
Dave Birch
Director of Innovation of Consult Hyperion
David G.W Birch is an author, advisor and commentator on digital financial services. He is a Director of Consult Hyperion (the secure electronic transactions consultancy that he helped to found), Technology Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Financial Innovation (the London-based think tank), a Visiting Professor at the University of Surrey Business School and holds a number of board-level advisory roles. Before helping to found Consult Hyperion (one of the very first companies on the Surrey University Business Park) in 1986, he spent several years working as a consultant in Europe, the Far East and North America. He graduated from the University of Southampton with a B.Sc (Hons.) in Physics. Dave was named one of the global top 15 favourite sources of business information (Wired magazine) and one of the top ten most influential voices in banking (Financial Brand); created one of the top 25 “must read’ financial IT blogs; was found to be one of the top ten Twitter accounts followed by innovators, along with Bill Gates and Richard Branson (PR Daily); was ranked in the top three most influential people in London’s FinTech community (City A.M.), was voted one of the European “Top 40” people in digital financial services (Financial News), was listed of the world’s top 100 most influential FinTech leaders (Hot Topics) and rated Europe’s most influential commentator on emerging payments (Total Payments).
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About Consult Hyperion: Consult Hyperion is an independent strategic and technical consultancy.
Kebbie Sebastian
Managing Director of Penser
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About Penser: Specialist consulting firm focused on the payments and fintech industry
Alexandre Massart
Director of Penser
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About Penser: Specialist consulting firm focused on the payments and fintech industry
Mike Warriner
Non Executive Director of Classlist.com
Mike Warriner is SVP Engineering for Crypto.com, building a world class Crypto-currency engineering team across Europe. Previously VP/CTO for Skyscanner, Digital CIO at HSBC and Engineering Director at Google, Mike has 30 years of experience across all aspects of the technology industry. Mike has a passion for STEM and Computer Science education and making sure that our children are able to be instrumental in the amazing technical opportunities that are all around them. He holds a MA in Computer Science from Cambridge University and lives in the UK with his wife and two young children.
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About Crypto.com: Classlist enables parents at the same school to make trusted, secure connections; making their life easier and school communities stronger.
Joseph Darkins
Technology Director of Fonix
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About Fonix: Fonix is a cellular phone distributor that supplies telecommunication handsets.
Abdul Ojomu
Managing Director MMIT UK of Mobile Media Info Tech Global Limited
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About Mobile Media Info Tech Global Limited: Mobile Media Info Tech (MMIT) is a mobile payment processing company.
Michael Ingelog
Board of Directors of Basware
Board member, Investor and advisor with an expert area within Finance and Digitalisation. Former CEO for Credit Suisse in the Nordic region, and Head of Markets for Deutsche Bank in the Nordic. Extensive experience in regulation, capital markets and build up of high performing teams within the financial sector.
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About : Basware provides enterprise purchase to pay and financial management solutions.
Simon Kelton
Co-Founder & Director of pepperhq
Simon is a relentlessly determined, passionate and ambitious entrepreneur, writer, film producer and angel investor with twenty-five years of broad-ranging creative and business experience. With an exceptional international network of friends, colleagues, investors and commercial contacts, Simon is able to combine his visionary creativity and communication skills as a professional writer to guide and sell his companies strategic goals and products. He has founded, financed and managed eight companies in entertainment, technology, publishing, event management and the snowsports industry. He has Master’s Degrees from Oxford, Stanford and UCLA and is a member of the British Academy of Film and TV. As a professional writer, Simon has published two books, written more than thirty screenplays for Hollywood including the British hit comedy EDDIE THE EAGLE starring Hugh Jackman and produced by Matthew Vaughn, and penned numerous articles for the likes of TIME, the Daily Mail, Sunday Telegraph, Harpers and Queen, and Worth.com. An avid and competitive sportsman, Simon represented Oxford University at golf, is a member of the Royal & Ancient G.C. and the Queen’s Club, has ski guided for the Ski Club of Great Britain, and taken part in the British and World Extreme Snowboarding Championships.
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About pepperhq: The Pepper platform supports white label apps for mobile payment, discovery, digital loyalty, social media marketing, and actionable data.
Malcolm Woolliams
Director of Direction Forward
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About Direction Forward: Working with enterprises, businesses, organisations and individuals on how to best leverage digital technologies to deliver maximum value.
Bill Thomson
Director of Payatrader
Bill Thomson, MD, has over 18 years experience in the cards and payments industry. A former FD and MD at Barclaycard Business, MD at Payzone and a founder of NetBanx – the UK’s first generally available agnostic online PSP at the outset of e-commerce in the UK.
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About Payatrader: Payatrader is the UK’s leading segmented card services provider.
Keith Brown
Managing Director of Paythru
Keith is one of the founders of Paythru. Prior to his current role, Keith ran a successful business in Financial Services marketing for 15 years called KBA Marketing. Formed at the end of 1990; the original concept was to develop financial services propositions to non-financial services organisations primarily predicated on the skills of database and direct marketing. Keith has also worked for Lloyds of London, BUPA, Target Life, Grattan and Next in a number of management roles covering disciplines such as legal, business systems, marketing and more. He is a law graduate and qualified Company Secretary.
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About Paythru: Paythru is a financial services and technology business which provides an award winning.
Pat Patel
Content Director of Money20/20
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About Money20/20: Money20/20 is a provider of a marketplace for ideas, connections, and deals in payments and financial services.
Pat Patel
Content Director of Money20/20
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About Money20/20: Money20/20 is a provider of a marketplace for ideas, connections, and deals in payments and financial services.
Paul Stokes
Managing Director of Gener8 Finance
Paul Stokes is a director at Gener8 Finance Ltd, one of the country’s leading independent invoice finance companies. An expert in working capital finance, banking and commercial finance broking, Paul has an in-depth knowledge of the funding options available to businesses and has a reputation for problem-solving and helping business owners obtain the funding they need.
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About Gener8 Finance: Gener8 Finance is one of the UK’s leading providers of cashflow solutions to SMEs.
