Payments Experts

I'll help you decrease processing fees by 20%, and improve approval rates, guaranteed — or your money back. 

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Founder & CEO

Shift4 Europe (formerly Finaro)

Director Of Sales & Business Development

• Leading the technical engagement with customers and partners to ensure that the functionality, performance, services, and technical infrastructure are clearly understood and executed.
• Identify & build customized solutions for strategic customers and managing their delivery
• Actively involved in analysis, solution design, client communication, and implementation
• Close collaboration with different internal teams (such as Product, R&D, sales, marketing, operations & support)

Solution Architect

Hey-CPA

Hey-CPA offers a CPA as-a-service platform, automating Bookkeeping work.
• As a CTO I was responsible for all technology aspects: software development, specification, design, architecture, infrastructure, and implementation.
• Built the code and the product from the ground up to be scalable and user-friendly.
• Product presentation, Sales & Recruitment of new businesses.
• Engaging customers, to continuously collect feedback and improve the product.

Co-founder & CTO

Isracard

• Project leader and coordinator, achieving success through collaboration with multiple departments, including R&D, Product Managers, Sales & Marketing.
• Responsible for Business Development, partner success, and Go-to-Market strategy.
• Maintaining positive relationships with business partners and customers to ensure adoption success.

Technology Project Leader (Product Owner)

Wix.com

• Working with the most cutting edge methodologies and technologies to develop ground-breaking web platforms, optimized for performance and scale - Wix platform - which is used by millions of people around the globe every day to build websites. 
• Understand and leverage customers business challenges to expand revenue and increase usage rate.
• Worked in a small team, that follows agile work methods and use continuous integration/deployment methodologies to run quickly as a startup while maintaining the high-end quality of the product.

Web Developer at Wix.com

Touche

• Work in a cross-functional team to deliver a complete user experience.
• Development of full projects, client and server-side - from specification and UI to the stage deployment on the servers.
• Expert in JavaScript and Web development.
• Presented the company and its technology at conventions and trade shows all over the world.

Full Stack Developer

ClickSoftware

• Helped enterprises and SMBs solve workforce management obstacles using ClickSoftware products
• Worked closely with customers and partners, onsite and remotely, to ensure the successful launch of new products.

Solution Specialist

Ness Technologies

Software Development Instructor

RE4MA Group SL

Direct Retail in shopping centers
• Extensive experience in frontal sales, Retail activities, brands development.
• Managed the sales organization (120 employees) in 27 locations globally.
• Responsibility for the Go-To-Market strategy and sales plan.

Sales and Product Line Manager

The Payment Solutions Guy — I'll help you decrease processing fees by 20%, and improve approval rates (guaranteed) by finding the best Payment Providers for your business | Visit my website to learn how

We help companies struggling with difficulty finding the right payment solution, high transaction fees, low approval rates, hidden fees to decrease processing fees by 20% and improve approval rates by 5-10%.

Using our unique Discovery & Assessment process, Payments Strategy, Cost Optimization, and Increase Approval Rates steps from day one. 

If we cannot achieve these results, we will continue to work with our clients for free until we do.

Alan Brian Dardic

Transforming Payments with People, Strategy, and Execution | Co-founder & MD

Helping companies realize their growth goals in payments with People, Strategy & Execution. Also, I like to share my knowledge about payments so follow me if you'd like to stay updated.

PaymentGenes helps clients realize growth with 4 services (see more 👉): 


Recruitment (People & Execution)

🤝 The leading Payments Recruitment company for high-quality & strategic hires
🚀 We drastically decrease the time-to-hire for clients & generate a high ROI through payments knowledge
⭐ NPS: 9 out of 10 customers would recommend PaymentGenes Recruitment 
🗣️ “High work ethics. Clear and straightforward communication” & “The support and collaboration of the office has been crucial to get my current role”


Consultancy (Strategy & Execution)

💼 Our consultancy services provide tailored solutions to optimize your payments strategy and drive growth.
🔍 We solve pain points such as lack of clarity around regulatory compliance, inefficient payment processing, and limited global expansion opportunities.
🗣️ “Key contribution to defining our merchant services proposition, partner selection and implementation of the joint venture”


Interim (People & Execution)

👨‍💼 Our interim recruitment services provide top-notch expertise to bridge talent gaps and ensure seamless business continuity.
👥 We solve the lack of in-house expertise, unexpected talent gaps, and the need for seamless business continuity during periods of change.


Ps. Some other things I love: 
⚽ Ajax Amsterdam ❌❌❌
🌍Travel, Nature, and the environment.
🏃‍♂️ Sports-fanatic, inquisitive, and enthusiastic.
🐕 My dogs (and my Family ツ )

Bram Vreugdenhil

It's that time of the year again! Merchant Payments Ecosystem is coming up soon, and I will lead the 5k run again to boost the dopamine! 

A great way to start the day, meet like-minded people, and connect. Who will join me?

#running #mpe2026 #networking #dopamine

The payments industry generated $2.5 trillion in revenue in 2024 💳

➡️Transaction volumes keep rising.
➡️Digital wallets are everywhere.
➡️Instant payments are becoming the norm.

By most metrics, payments have never looked stronger.

Yet in almost every conversation I have with payments CEOs lately, one theme keeps coming up: MARGINS 

Revenue growth has slowed to around 4% annually. Interest income is plateauing as rates fall. Interchange caps are tightening. And the compliance bill is growing with PSD3, AMLA, MiCAR, and DORA. 📊 

At the same time, payment companies are becoming more operationally complex. Compliance teams. KYC specialists. Fraud monitoring. Regulatory reporting.

These roles are no longer optional. They are the costs of operating a licensed payments business.

That pressure is already showing up across the industry.

Block reduced its workforce from over 10,000 to under 6,000.
PayPal cut 2,500 roles.
Stripe trimmed hundreds more.

But layoffs are not the real story.

The companies quietly pulling ahead are rebuilding their operating models. Relocating operational teams such as compliance, AML, KYC, and support to locations where the cost base can be 60 to 80 percent lower, while maintaining the same capability and control. 🌍 

I wrote a piece exploring why this shift is happening now and what the smartest payments companies are doing about it.

The article is attached. I would love to hear your perspective.

#Payments #Fintech #OperationalEfficiency #PaymentGenes #FinancialServices #Compliance #PSP #PaymentsIndustry

The Payments Profitability Paradox

Payment companies are racing to deploy AI.
But the real bottleneck isn’t technology.
It’s talent.

Recently, I recorded a Voice of MPE podcast episode with Anton Kornilov, where we explored a topic becoming increasingly relevant across the payments ecosystem.

AI is rapidly entering everything from fraud detection to compliance automation and customer analytics. But deploying the technology is only part of the equation.

The harder challenge is organisational.

Research shows the payments industry is facing a shift in required skills. Professionals increasingly need a mix of technology, regulation, product thinking, and AI governance, capabilities that traditional financial services careers rarely produce. 

In our conversation, we discussed what leadership looks like in AI-enabled payments organisations, why many AI initiatives struggle to move beyond experimentation, and which capabilities the next generation of professionals should focus on building.

The competitive advantage of payments firms is increasingly becoming their talent mix, not just their technology stack.

And technology skills alone are not enough.

As the industry becomes more complex, companies are rediscovering the value of deep payments expertise alongside product and engineering talent.

That intersection of technology and domain expertise will likely define the next generation of payments leaders.

This is exactly the type of discussion we want to bring to Merchant Payments Ecosystem Berlin 2026.

If you’re attending MPE this year, I’d love to hear your view.

What skills will define the next generation of payments talent?

🎥 Watch here: https://lnkd.in/d5P8wdtj 
🎧 Listen here: https://lnkd.in/eFsSS_m6 

#Payments #Fintech #AI #MPE2026

Stablecoins keep appearing in payments headlines. But this week’s funding round highlights how quickly this space is moving. 👀

Stablecoin payments startup KAST has raised $80M in Series A funding, reaching a $600M valuation. The round was led by QED Investors and Left Lane Capital, with participation from DST Global and Peak XV Partners. 💰

The company is focused on turning stablecoins into everyday financial accounts. 💳 Users can hold digital dollars, send cross-border payments, and spend them through traditional card networks like Visa. In essence, the model connects crypto native liquidity with existing payments rails.

KAST’s founder and CEO Raagulan Pathy framed the ambition clearly. The funding, raised less than 18 months after launch, reflects strong investor confidence in the stablecoin thesis and in KAST’s ability to scale globally. Their long-term objective is straightforward: to build the leading platform for the stablecoin world for both consumers and businesses.

That ambition says a lot about where the industry might be heading. Today, most stablecoin activity still sits inside crypto markets, while real-world payments represent only a small share of the total volume.

If companies like KAST succeed, stablecoins may quietly become the settlement layer behind everyday financial services. ⚙️ Not replacing banks or card networks, but potentially rewiring how money moves between them.

The real question now is not whether stablecoins will grow, but where they will integrate first and which parts of the payments stack will change because of it.

#Stablecoins #Payments #Fintech #DigitalPayments

Everyone says AI will solve trust in digital payments.

But what if we are solving the wrong problem? 👇

A 2026 study in Telematics and Informatics Reports examined how AI-driven security features influence adoption among 300 university students.

The result was not what most executives would expect.

It was not fraud engines or advanced risk models that had the strongest impact.

It was the experience of the transaction itself.

AI-enabled transaction procedures such as biometric login, adaptive verification, and intelligent prompts had the highest impact on perceived trust, with a coefficient of 1.017.

By contrast, technical protections operating behind the scenes had a far smaller effect, between 0.101 and 0.133.

Even more revealing, security statements increased perceived safety but did not increase trust.

🔐 Invisible protection reassures.
🧠 Visible process builds trust.
📢 Messaging alone does neither.

For leaders, the takeaway is simple: Ask your product teams how your UX communicates security, not just how your models detect fraud.

In a market where everyone claims to be secure, the real differentiator is not the algorithm.

It is whether your customer clicks Confirm without hesitation. 🚀

[Source: Ofosu Ampong et al. 2026, Telematics and Informatics Reports, Vol 21, Article 100298, Table 7 and Section 4.3]

#FinTech #DigitalPayments #AI #Regtech #Fraud

How AI-enabled security features shape payment security...

Europe doesn’t have a payments problem.
It has a complexity problem.

For years, payments were treated as a utility. Minimise fees. Reduce fraud. Keep the lights on.

That model is now a growth cap.

According to The Payments Report by Mollie
• 24% of card payments already run through wallets 
• Wallet usage has grown 57% since 2023
• Intelligent optimisation is generating >3% revenue uplift
• Hundreds of millions in revenue have been recovered across European businesses

Meanwhile, SEPA Instant is turning finance teams into 24/7 treasuries.
PSD3 is shifting fraud liability.
Wero is introducing dispute logic into what used to be guaranteed bank rails.

The operational tax is rising.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth:
Most businesses are still negotiating basis points while leaking margin due to fragmentation, false declines, reconciliation drag, and structural inefficiencies.

The real KPI is not “cost of acceptance.”

It’s Operational Net Yield.

In 2026, payments will not sit under Finance.
They will sit at the centre of product, data, and strategy.

The winners won’t be those with the lowest fees.
They’ll be the ones who turn transactions into commercial intelligence.

Are you still managing noise?
Or are you mining signals?

#Payments #FintechStrategy #PaymentInnovation #EuropeanPayments

Stablecoins were designed to bypass banks.

Now, central banks are warning they could weaken monetary policy itself. ⚠️

That sounds dramatic. After all, stablecoins still represent a relatively small share of global payments.

So why is the European Central Bank raising concerns?

Because the risk is not on today’s scale.
It is what happens if stablecoins actually succeed.

Monetary policy works largely through the banking system. 🏦
When central banks change interest rates, those signals pass through deposits, lending, and liquidity conditions.

But imagine a parallel monetary layer where large volumes of value sit in privately issued digital tokens instead of bank deposits. 💰

Three structural shifts could emerge.

1️⃣ Deposit migration
If households and firms begin holding value in stablecoins, banks could lose a stable funding base.

2️⃣ Weaker policy transmission
Interest rate changes directly influence bank deposits, but stablecoins may not react in the same way. 📉

3️⃣ Liquidity pressure in times of stress
Large redemption waves could create sudden flows between stablecoin reserves and the banking system. 🔄

Now here is the main question: Who ultimately controls the plumbing of money? 🧠

If private digital money becomes large enough, central banks may find themselves steering an economy where the pipes no longer run through banks.

And that would fundamentally change how monetary policy works.

#Stablecoins #Payments #Fintech #ECB

I need to say something that I think a lot of people in payments already know but aren't acting on.

Your operational cost structure is killing your margins. And every quarter you wait to fix it, your competitors pull further ahead.

Over the past decade at PaymentGenes, I've had thousands of conversations with payments founders, CEOs, and CFOs. The last twelve months, one line keeps coming up:

"We need to do more with less."

Not as a buzzword. As a survival imperative.

Revenue growth has slowed. Compliance costs are accelerating. Salaries in Amsterdam, London, and New York aren't coming down. PSD3, AMLA, MiCAR — the regulatory pipeline only gets heavier.

The companies winning right now have figured out that 50–70% of their operational workload doesn't need to sit in expensive headquarters cities. They're building dedicated teams of experienced payments professionals in locations where total cost of employment is 60–80% lower.

Not outsourcing to call centres. Building genuine extensions of their business — same tools, same processes, same standards.

The competitive gap is opening. Companies with strong margins are investing, acquiring, and growing. Companies absorbing unnecessary cost are cutting marketing, freezing headcount, and falling behind.

I wrote about why the cost of standing still is the most expensive decision a payments company can make right now.

Article attached. If this resonates, let's talk. I will be at Merchant Payments Ecosystem, so happy to grab a coffee to discuss! 

#Payments #Fintech #CostOptimisation #FinancialServices #Compliance

The cost of standing still

Last week, around 4,000 jobs disappeared overnight.

Not because the company was in trouble. Because it decided to change.

Block., led by Jack Dorsey, cut roughly 40% of its workforce as part of a shift toward an AI-first operating model.

The market loved it. The stock jumped.

That contrast is what makes this moment interesting.

For a long time, layoffs meant something had gone wrong. Now they increasingly signal something else entirely. A redesign. A reset. A belief that technology can carry more of the weight.

But here is the part I keep thinking about.

Are we building organisations that are genuinely stronger, or simply lighter?

Allica Bank CEO Richard Davies recently spoke about growth coming from investing in people alongside technology, not treating them as substitutes. That feels like an important distinction.

AI will change how work gets done. That is not the debate. The real question is whether we use it to elevate capability or just compress cost.

The companies that win will not be the fastest to cut. They will be the clearest about what they are building.

Because transformation is not something that happens to you. It is something you decide to shape. 🚀

#ArtificialIntelligence #Leadership #FutureOfWork #BusinessStrategy

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Bram Vreugdenhil

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The Battle

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Bram Vreugdenhil

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Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Bram Vreugdenhil's LinkedIn Performance

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