FEATURED REPLAY: Streamlining Payments with Elavon's Chief Product Officer, Pari Sawant

Speaker A: Welcome to the Georgia Fintech Academy Podcast. The Georgia Fintech Academy is a collaboration between Georgia's fintech industry and the University System of Georgia. This talent development initiative addresses a massive demand for fintech professionals and gives learners the specialized education experiences needed to enter the fintech sector.

Speaker B: Welcome to the Georgia Fintech Academy Podcast. My name is Laura Gibson Lamoth. Today's episode promises to be an insightful dive into the world of payments innovation as we're here to explore the dynamic interactions of fintech and career growth, featuring some of the most inspiring voices. Joining me today is special guest Pari Sawant, who is the Chief Product Officer at Elevine. Pari has been, uh, at the forefront of Elevon's product innovations, including their latest achievement, which we're going to be talking about today. We'll be discussing how this new solution is revolutionizing payments processing and driving the technology and the customer experience alike. I also wanted to introduce our co host today, our student co host, Kitty Kim. Kitty, you're out there on the line.

Speaker C: Hey everyone, my name is Kenny Kim. I am a current student at Georgia State University majoring in finance. This is my first time on the podcast and I'm excited to learn about Peri and also learn about the industry and the future of payments.

Speaker B: Okay, thank you so much Kenny and we're so excited to have you as part of this discussion today. So let's dive into the topic and explore more with Pari. Pari. Ironically you're traveling here in Atlanta and we're in Atlanta, so it's cool to be in the same place, just not physically but co located. You've done a lot in your career and I'm just wondering if you could highlight your journey, um, up to where you are today in your current role, um, as chief Product officer.

Speaker D: Thanks a lot. I'm glad to be here. Atlanta has just a great vibe as a city. I always enjoy my trips to Atlanta. Um, I consider myself uh, a fintech rebound. I started um, um, my career way back at eBay and PayPal, then went into core banking working on real time payments, then left banking, went into machine learning and AI and then came back to payments. When I was doing machine learning and AI, a lot of data we used to drive good results was transactional data. I really felt that the opportunity, uh, payments data had to bring it to life for our merchants, both small business or enterprise customers, was exciting and that's the reason I came back into payments.

Speaker B: Just thinking about your previous, uh, experience leading up to your current role and some of the things that you've led in the organization, how was that transition and what did that look like for you and how does it influence your strategic vision for the things you can grow and enhance? Um, while at Elegan?

Speaker D: Yeah, I think as a product person, um, everything comes down to a particular experience and the way you bring this experience to life for the customers you serve is what we are all uh, trying to optimize for. And then of course you have to bring together the people and the technology to make that magic happen.

Speaker B: So we've talked previously around Elavon's payments gateway and the launch of that. Can you share a high level overview of that new payment gateway?

Speaker D: Yeah, um, absolutely. So Elavon has always had market leading products. Uh, for over 20 years we had a product called Shoesbox which was benchmarked as the fastest gateway but it really did well in face to face payments. Specifically in hospitality. We had another product called Converge which excelled in online payments. However, with commerce evolving into a truly multichannel experience, we recognized the need for a single platform that would support merchants across various channels. Whether it's online, in store, mobile or social. The loan payment gateway was developed to fulfill this need, enabling omnichannel commerce across North America and Europe. Few uh, differentiators for us. It's a global platform which serves both North America and the European markets. Uh, it supports a diverse uh, set of customers. We focused on small businesses right now, uh, but we plan to extend to enterprise customers in 2025. Um, it comes bundled with um, support for the latest Android point of sale terminals. Ah to drive face to face payments, ensuring the latest technology is at the counter. It comes with uh, comprehensive online, mobile and social capabilities. It's got customizable checkout widgets, a wide range of support for digital wallets, and a full suite of APIs for easy integration and finally access to unique value added services. We as part of US bank want to bring the best of banking, money movement and payment capabilities to our merchants. So it comes bundled with an AI powered fraud detection engine. Uh, it's got real time uh, money movement capabilities. It's got financing options like buy now, pay later for consumers as uh, well as quick capital loans for small businesses.

Speaker B: Wow. The scope is so great and vast and thinking from my personal experience, I recall back in the day how difficult it was to test some of these features that you're mentioning like even the mobile experience and trying to replicate all mobile devices and the latest version of the software. It's just amazing to hear that you're thinking not Only from the core payments gateway. But the user experiences on the multiple types of use cases and scenarios that you just highlighted, it's very innovative. Kenny, you uh, prepared a question around the gateway.

Speaker C: Yeah. So regarding the new payment gateway, how does this align with Lovant's mission and what does this mean for current and prospective users?

Speaker D: Our mission at uh, Loan and US bank has always been to put our hearts and minds into powering human potential. The um, Elavon payments gateway aligns with this by offering a seamless, secure and innovative uh, payment solution that grows with the evolving needs of our merchants and their consumers. For our merchants, uh, this means streamline payment operations and reduce complexities of operating a business. They can offer their consumers a consistent, flexible and secure transactional experience across all channels. This helps them stay competitive and relevant in the market.

Speaker B: That's a great segue to our next question. And not to get too technical or too deep in this, but you mentioned streamlining the payments process. I think you also just highlighted between small businesses and larger enterprise businesses as well. But what are some of the benefits for streamlining these operational processes?

Speaker D: Yeah, see for small businesses it's about having a uh, unified payments platform to accept payments in store, online, via mobile and on. All businesses will start on different spectrums and they will expand. Uh, so having that one platform to grow with is important. Second is enhanced security access to advanced encryption systems 3Ds or point to point secure security at the point of sale devices. Tokenization helps uh, keep these transactions secure for our small businesses. And third is by consolidating these uh, payment functions, small businesses can eventually lower their cost of payment acceptance. For enterprises, um, it's slightly a different mindset. Right. For them it's about global reach. Uh, they want to have one platform which they can deploy across regions. Uh, it's about ease of integration into systems. Right. They uh, have their own systems they want to integrate into uh, gateways and drive better experiences for, for their consumers. The third thing which is, which is showing up more and more is access to this comprehensive transactional data which enterprises want to tap into and harness, better serve and personalize experiences for their consumers. Right. Uh, for consumers it's about um, a seamless experience. It's ah, a smooth checkout experience in store, mobile, wherever they are, uh, and the flexibility of using um, the way they want to pay for those transactions. And finally of course security. Right. For consumers and for small businesses. I think all of this needs to happen uh, with uh, security in mind, um, for all these transactions.

Speaker B: Yeah, I know just as a consumer, I'm sure Kenny can attest to this. I think you expect businesses large or small to be able to take payments in any method that you prefer to use. I know for myself I have the expectation of being able to use my digital wallet it everywhere. But it's exciting to hear you say you as a gateway it literally can grow with a business. There's multiple different types of connection points that a business can tap into that can enhance the customer's experience on the other end. One of the benefits that you highlighted was the fact that it's a um, one point for the business. They come to you for everything versus having a hodgepodge of different solutions and being able to universally provide a solution. Um, how does this reflect the broader trends in what you're seeing across the payments industry?

Speaker D: Yeah, um, I think the relevant payments gateway now aligns with the trends we see. The one trend we see is um, a lot of commerce growth is driven by omnichannel growth. Merchants are increasingly focused on offering seamless experiences. A consumer buy and buy might buy online and then pick up in store. You might buy online and return in store. These are the experiences which we need to unlock for our small business merchant. And the gateway supports these evolving customer preferences. Um, the second trend we are seeing is payments are becoming invisible. They're getting embedded into software. The 11 UM payments gateway supports a wide range of integration patterns right from checkout widgets to hosted payment pages to APIs to integrate into that software. The third trend we are seeing is to leverage the uh, public cloud infrastructure which offers uh, the ability to scale um, and some inherent security. Finally I would say is security. Right. Building on top of the cloud, um, uh, infrastructure security. Having a multi layered approach uh, which includes CD secure. I talked about point to point encryption, tokenization and aligning with industry standards to keep these transactions secure. These are the trends we see and on payment gateway aligns with the market.

Speaker B: Let's tap into uh, security just a little bit deeper. We've talked about and you highlighted security, you've highlighted fraud protection and managing fraud as well and the platform. And then the other side is maintaining compliance on behalf of your clients. How does Elevon ensure the security of transactions you already mentioned? 3Ds. What does that look like at a high level?

Speaker D: Yeah, I think for us security is embedded in everything we do. It's always top of mind. Um, and our approach is to use a uh, multi layered approach uh, as we approach security. Right. Um, this includes infrastructure at the cloud level. On top of it we build with using uh, advanced data encryption methodologies like 3DS or AES in some cases for face to face payments we use uh, network tokens uh, which are powered by vsat, uh also to uh, enhance security. And then eventually we had uh, the industry was using rule based AI engines, fraud detection engines. Now we've replaced them by a more dynamic AI um driven fraud engine which continuously is looking at trends and patterns to evolve fraud detection. So this is the multilayer kind of approach. We use um, to make sure that every transaction is as secure as possible.

Speaker C: M the technology that you mentioned, powering the gateway in terms of security and um, compliance how do these impact these technologies on user trust and satisfaction?

Speaker D: These technologies enable customers to process payments um, with confidence and knowing that the data is protected by industry leading standards. But it's always a mix about technology and people. Right. If there's an issue, our consumers and merchants know that they are back with a dedicated team that deeply understands the payment space and that we are here to support that. And all of this really enhances trust and satisfaction across the board.

Speaker B: The uh, reliability if that's the right word to use, having that trust is key. And for these businesses I know they're being able to proceed with confidence leveraging all of the innovations that you just mentioned but then knowing on the back end that there is the security and the oversight and the rigor around compliance is really compelling. Now let's get to the fun stuff. The user experience UX and real world application is always interesting to me. We talked a lot. You know, focus has been on the core features I think of the payments gateway and what that means to the user experience is key. Can you describe the user experiences with this new gateway? I think from a business perspective and from a consumer perspective and how it was designed for ease of use.

Speaker D: Yeah, I think our current focus has been on the small business segment and the needs vary in that segment. So maybe I'll just give you a few examples. Right. If you're uh, a personal trainer and you want to set up a very simple subscription plan for your consumers, the payment gateway allows you to do that pretty quickly. With a few clicks you can create a subscription plan for your consumers. For the immediate next complexity is if you're an online seller and you have your website and you're selling on Instagram and these social channels, it allows you to create buy links and embed these products in these channels so you can drive commerce onto your site or capture purchases from the channels you sell. In uh, and the more complex it gets is where you're operating in a true omnichannel mindset where you have physical shops, um, and then you're selling online. Um, and all of this uh, with point of sale devices, uh, in play can be orchestrated through uh, a common platform. I thought the world is all about digital wallets. So it comes built with, you can turn on, switch on and switch off digital wallets at ease. And it also has support for pays, which is one of the latest digital wallets launched by the top banks in the US with the likes of course Apple Pay and Google Pay. So that's what we've got uh, for small businesses next year. We're also focused our mind on the enterprise market.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker D: And we're going to start with hospitality. We have a very vibrant hospitality, um, customer base and for them they have, each of them have uh, proprietary and in some cases common property management systems where uh, folio data from uh, consumers comes through and they'll be able to integrate their property management systems into their gateway seamlessly and process transactions. Um, and that's the bridge we're trying to um, bring together for hospitality. And there are other verticals we are considering in the future.

Speaker B: I can't wait till that happens from a hospitality perspective. As a user, one of the most painful experiences is to have your folio that you're, you're trying to manage while you're on site at a hotel or resort and then you go to the restaurant that's also in the same hotel and resort and the disconnects between the two establishments are disruptive kind of uh, customer experience. So streamlining that by way of payments gateway could really move the needle for hospitality. So thinking about just your career path, specifically as a Chief Product Officer, do you have any advice for students who are interested in product management or Fintech or both?

Speaker D: I'll answer this on two fronts. Uh, first I'll just maybe get you a couple of insights into my career. Uh, when I was graduating one of my professors, uh, said to me, the day you graduate you will be outdated. These words have stuck with me ever since. Uh, one of the first things in my journey has been that learning, uh, is constant. Learning is lifelong. You have to keep learning new technologies, the markets evolve, you have to keep that muscle exercise always. So that's one thing I've done all throughout my career. In your career there'll be phases where you'll have to make decisions and trying to avoid, just go with the flow but actually having intent. So you modeled all the scenarios. Right. Uh, and you've got intent and conviction on what you want to do next, uh, is important. Um, and with that intent and conviction, uh, not everything is going to work in your favor, but at least it'll give you a structured process to get to a decision which you can find to help you in the, in the long run. For students, you are living in an incredible age with access to abundant information. My call to action is don't just get educated and find a job. Think about what you like to do and then get educated to that job. When you're passionate about your work, it becomes more than a job. It becomes a fulfilling journey in many cases.

Speaker B: Hari, just hearing you speak about that, I think about your experience leading to your current role. One of the things I could hear in your voice is that excitement, that passion, that curiosity. You also seem to have a technical background. And in my experience on the industry side for almost 20 years, the product managers or product leaders that I'm used to seeing were more business focused but have, uh, a combination of skills that sets you apart. Do you think this is a unique thing as far as, like, how leaders are looking at product? Being a technology enabler, obviously. But the level of technical experience you have in your background, does that set you apart from others in the industry? Necessarily?

Speaker D: I think going back to one of the philosophies I had is intent. I definitely have, uh, a technical background. I had a master's in computer science, uh, which I started with. Uh, I started my career in enterprise software. Uh, then there was an intent for me to go into the consumer piece at ebay and really learn. And consumer software is driven by a lot of data. There was intent to look at that side of it. There was intent to go from technical to get into, uh, the business side of it. Then went on and got my master's in business administration. That was again, intent, intentfully done. I think having that intent, uh, on what you want to do and having the conviction is very important.

Speaker B: M. Kenny, I know you have a question prepared for this.

Speaker C: Yeah. So, uh, I'm going to be graduating soon. As Fintech is evolving, what do you see in the future of payments? And are there any evolving trends that you find exciting?

Speaker D: Uh, this is a very loaded question. We can probably spend, uh, a good two, uh, hours on this, so I'm going to keep it short. Many exciting trends. I would maybe just take the top three. Right. First, I've mentioned it earlier, it's invisible payments. Right. Payments are going to be seamless and automatic. You've seen folks talk about how Uber is going to revolutionize payments. I think that's what you're going to get. You'll have refrigerators, uh, reordering your milk. You, uh, might have your car, uh, paying for, uh, gas, uh, at the station automatically. That's the future which is coming our way. Right. Um, second, I think biometrics, right, um, this, this technology is still evolving. Uh, there are multitudes of biometrics that use right now. You can. People have experimented with voice, uh, with iris scans, face recognition, uh, palm veins. The, uh, newest one I've seen is they actually look at your hand and the vein inside it. You need, uh, biometrics to not only verify you, but you also need consent. So with the PAMs, when you wave, you can actually provide consent. So there's a lot of things happening there. But I think biometrics will make transactions more secure and experiences more frictionless for us going forward. The last one, I would say, of course, is AI and generative AI. I think that has the potential to really revolutionize the entire landscape for payments. It can help with not only getting our merchants discover the products which are right for them, but we're using them to detect fraud. It can also help with payment operations on the back end where you want to file for chargebacks. It can actually automate the entire process for you. So I think that's one area which I'm also excited about. The potential of having AI and generative AI coming to a fruition in payments.

Speaker B: That's exciting stuff, especially the biometrics. I feel like I need to go nerd out and do some research on how that's evolved. You mentioned the palm beans. That's amazing stuff. At a lot of conferences, people showcase different technologies from a biometrics perspective. So I'm really excited about that and the AI pieces that you mentioned as well. Any closing remarks from either of you, Kitty or Pari, as we wrap up today's discussion?

Speaker C: Yeah, I have one. The insight you gave on the new global payment system is very interesting. Your background in technology and obviously the career that you had being so engaging in what you do, and also the products that you're promoting and working on, it's amazing to see because this correlates with how fintech is evolving, honestly.

Speaker D: Thanks, Kenny. Laura, thanks for having me on the podcast. I think we live in an exciting era, uh, where innovation will continue to drive payments. US Banks are also excited to be part of this journey to really shape the future of payments and make every transaction better and safer than the one before, right? And for all the students like you, Kenny out there, get excited and definitely consider a career in payments.

Speaker C: Gotcha. Keep that in mind.

Speaker B: Thank you all for listening. This is the end of another episode of the Georgia FinTech Academy podcast. Continue to follow us on LinkedIn and on other social platforms. We'll be looking forward to our next episode. Thank you so much, Pari, for a wonderful discussion today and Kinney for your support as well.

Speaker A: The Georgia FinTech Academy podcasts are available on itunes and Spotify. To obtain additional information about the the Georgia fintech Academy, please visit our website at georgiafintechacademy. Org.