Open Banking Expo Canada Speakers

Ada de Michele is a Strategic Risk Professional who partners with CFOs, CEOs, executives, and business owners to mitigate risks, and by doing so, contributes positively to bottom-line performance. After spending two decades working in Credit, Collections, and Accounts Receivables for top Fortune 500 companies such as Nike, Adidas, Valero Energy, and Wolseley Canada, Ada knows what truly drives business risk and operational performance as the head of a credit risk function – it’s the ability to balance unknown factors in traditional credit risk for an organization with a predictive analytical component.

Ada has led three major financial transformations in her career: leading large teams across multiple international boundaries. She has international credit experience and is often sought out as a speaker at industry credit conferences.

Ada is a trained Financial Analyst. She holds a BA in Political Science from York University, a Management Certificate from McGill University, and is a Certified Credit Professional.

Ben is a Partner and the Head of Partnerships and Policy at Portage Ventures. Prior to joining Portage in 2018, he spent more than 15 years at Canada Life in senior level strategy, product development and marketing roles across the organization, including the Head of Innovation for Canada.

As Head of Partnerships, Ben’s team works with those investors to help them execute on their strategic objectives through a combination of commercial partnerships with the fund’s portfolio companies and relevant and differentiated insights into the trends shaping the fintech sector.

Ben also leads Portage’s government affairs mandate and has helped to position the organization as a leading voice for pro competition and innovation policy developments. He sits on the board of the Paytechs of Canada and is a member of the Digital Identity Laboratories advisory panel.

Ben is a graduate of the Business Administration program (BBA) from Wilfrid Laurier University.

Electrified by all that is possible, when you dream as big as the world is!

At my core, I’m an entrepreneur, an economist, a technologist and a powerful storyteller.
Specifically, I love to tell stories and execute strategies that drive meaningful conversations and change some of the most significant issues in the world, like identity, data and financial literacy. My approach for achieving success has been led by investing in relationships and learning. I face my failures as parts of the process of experimentation, and necessary for growth.

Throughout my career, I’ve been a banker, I have led successful, diverse, and talented communications, technology, sales and technology product teams. I have created sales and PR campaigns, branded and repositioned companies and products. As a serial entrepreneur, I have recently co-founded talle, where I have worked for some of the most influential organizations in the world; including Visa, HSBC and most recently, the Brazilian Central Bank. At talle, we work as an external strategic agency partner to global finance organizations. We use creative media and storytelling strategies to share knowledge and build presence externally to a B2B ecosystem. We have operated projects in Europe, MENA, North America, Brazil, China and India.

My career path has been intentional and forward-thinking, always seeking missions and companies with ambition and challenges that would make me the best version of myself; allowing me to be a valuable contributing member of a leadership team and society. This mindset and approach have been the driving force behind what is now a diverse career that spans several technology and data heavy industries, including biometrics, banking, socially conscious e-commerce, and media.

With more than 20 years leading Data & Analytics teams in Credit Risk, Marketing and Loyalty Management, Bill presents complex analytical solutions through meaningful business stories, thinking from the customer perspective to address true business needs. Bill holds an MA in Economics from the University of Guelph.

Chantal Bernier leads Dentons’ Canadian Privacy and Cybersecurity practice group. She is also a member of the Firm’s Government Affairs and Public Policy group. With Chantal on board, Dentons is proud to be the only law firm in Canada with a former privacy regulator as a practicing lawyer. During her nearly six years at the helm of the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC), Chantal led national and international privacy investigations in the public and private sectors, as well privacy audits, privacy impact assessment reviews, technological analysis, and privacy policy development and research.

In her Government Affairs and Public Policy practice, Chantal leverages her many years in high-ranking positions at the Government of Canada to provide her clients with strategic counsel. Her experience as a senior executive also uniquely positions her to understand corporate management challenges in both the public and private sectors to find solutions that serve corporate interests and comply with the law. She serves clients in French, English, Italian and Spanish, and is very active at the international level.

Thought Leadership Specialties:
Canadian Prepaid Market
Rewards & Incentives

Chris is a B2B industry veteran and a respected expert in Canadian incentives—particularly as they relate to digital rewards. He advises businesses on how to leverage prepaid card options to develop meaningful relationships with shoppers, employees, business partners, and other key audiences. His expertise is relied upon by organizations looking to connect Canadians to the digital economy and tap into the growing popularity of prepaid cards as versatile payment, reward and incentives tools.

With more than 20 years of experience—more than 15 spent with Blackhawk Network—Chris has accumulated a deep understanding for how prepaid cards can drive desired behaviors, streamline business processes, connect consumers digitally and fuel sales.

Christine is the Chief Information and Technology Officer (CITO) for Questrade Financial Group acting as the CITO for multiple companies: Questrade, QuestWealth, QuestBank, and Community Trust. In this capacity, Christine led the growth of the technology team from 8 to over 470 IT staff in 4 countries. In tandem, she led the creation of Questrade’s suite of proprietary brokerage systems including an industry-leading, low-latency, direct access trading platform for equities on all North American markets. As both CIO and CTO, Christine provides Questrade with the leadership and technical capabilities to be consistently ranked as the fastest growing online brokerage, #1 online brokerage in Canada, and one of Canada’s best-managed companies for 10 consecutive years.

Christine Day offers a unique blend of objective analytical thinking, creativity, curiosity, and the tenacity to deliver results. She is a passionate advocate for consumers and leverages best-of-breed technology solutions as a mechanism for advocacy. Christine thrives on challenge. Where others may see barriers, Christine sees opportunities and leads others to gain comfort outside their comfort zones. She made significant contributions to a fundamental change in Canada’s regulatory posture and the introduction of Canada’s first Robo-advisory platform, QuestWealth Portfolios.

Christine is determined to modernize financial services in Canada for the benefit of all Canadians. Christine is an advisor on numerous industry boards and working groups. With a unique combination of expertise with financial services and financial technology, Christine has contributed greatly to transformative change in Canada, most notably the introduction of Open Banking and Real-Time Payments Rails. Christine is on the Member Advisory Council (MAC), a 20-person council codified in the Canadian Payments Act which serves as a consultative and engagement forum for system participants of Payments Canada. She is also on the Payments Canada Modernization Fraud Surveillance Steering Committee. Christine is on the Board of Directors for FDATA (Financial Data and Technology Association) working with government, regulatory authorities, and financial industry stakeholders to propel Open Banking in Canada. Christine has been a strong advocacy voice on dozens of conference panels and invitation-only consultations. Christine served on the Ontario Securities Commission Launchpad for two consecutive years to modernize regulation in capital markets and the TMX Group Executive Oversight Committee for Post-Trade System Modernization Projects.

Within technology more specifically, Christine served on the Board of Directors for the CIO Association of Canada for three years and on the Information Technology Management Advisory Council for Ryerson University, Ted Rogers School of Management. She is a frequent speaker at conferences and CIO gatherings on topics ranging from Women in Technology, CIO strategy, artificial intelligence, digital transformation, FinTech innovation, and IT leadership.

Corinne Pohlmann is Senior Vice President, National Affairs and Partnerships for the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB), a not-for-profit organization representing 95,000 small and medium-sized businesses across Canada. Corinne is based in Ottawa and is responsible for developing CFIB’s strategy on federal legislative issues, as well as overseeing CFIB’s Partnerships division, and Atlantic Canada legislative team.

Since joining the Federation in 1998, Corinne first worked in research, where she authored several research reports on a variety of public policy and economic issues. In 2000, Corinne became CFIB’s Director of Provincial Affairs based in Edmonton where she represented the interests of Alberta and NWT members to all levels of government and in 2006 she relocated to Ottawa to take on the responsibility of National Affairs.

Throughout her career, Corinne participated in numerous national consultations and committees on a wide variety of small business issues, including the Ministerial Advisory Committee on the Underground Economy, the Advisory Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, as well as the Deputy Minister Advisory Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

Corinne was born and raised in Montreal where she attended McGill University – graduating with both a Bachelor and a Masters Degree in Geography.

Craig Reiff is Vice President, Core Products for Mastercard Canada. Craig is responsible for the strategic direction and management of Mastercard Canada’s consumer credit, small business, prepaid, and debit portfolios. Additionally, he oversees the BNPL and Open Banking spaces for the Canadian market.

Craig has over 16 years of payments industry experience – the last nine at Mastercard.

Born in Cape Town, South Africa, and raised in Toronto, Canada. Craig has an Honors Business Administration (HBA) Degree from the Ivey School of Business at Western University.

Dianne leads Portfolio+ including all aspects of strategy, vision, go-to-market and growth initiatives. Her rich knowledge in the banking/financial services industry provides focus on creating value for customers, employees, and partners through open communication and collaboration across all teams.

Dinaro is the Head of Innovation Partnerships at Interac Corp., Canada’s #1 trusted financial services company. Dinaro is responsible for overseeing Interac’s ecosystem partnerships and community engagement strategies. He has over 15-years of experience establishing strategic partnerships with Fortune 100 companies in the technology, finance and retail sectors in North America and globally. Prior to Interac, he was at MaRS Discovery District, North America’s largest urban innovation hub as Director of Fintech Innovation and Partnerships. While there, Dinaro and his team helped build Canada’s first fintech practice while expanding MaRS’ financial services partner network and provided unique investment and partnership opportunities to support the Canadian FinTech community.

He brings deep experience in digital payments, marketing, partnerships, and business development across multiple verticals and is passionate about combining both social purpose and financial gain among all types of collaboration to bring prosperity and humanity back into the business process.

He is currently an advisor to the HOLT Accelerator and Innovate Financial Health Accelerator.

Diogo Silva is head of division in the financial system regulation department @ the Central Bank of Brazil. For the past 2 years and a half, he has led the team responsible for proposing the open banking regulatory strategy in Brazil. Diogo holds a bachelor of economics degree from the University of Brasilia and a post-graduate degree on Organizational Communication and Management from FIA Business School.

Elena is a senior product and technology executive in the financial industry with experience of launching new products, defining and executing technical strategy, pioneering use of emerging technologies, championing innovation, and scaling teams in fast-growing startups, banking, IT.  Today Elena is a Chief Product Officer in a stealth startup building upon her previous experience as a technology executive at KOHO, Canada’s challenger bank. Elena has actively participated in numerous Open Banking consultations and events; was an elected member of Stakeholder Advisory Committee for Payments Canada;  elected member at FinTech Advisory Committee, OSC LaunchPad; served on a board of TMAC Toronto. Elena is a  recipient of Innovation Award from Women in Payments and one of 35 women selected out of 500+ applicants to Money20/20’s inaugural Rise Up program, accelerating leadership through networking, mentorship and executive training.

As co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, Esther is dedicated to implementing robust yet adaptive streamlined processes in order to conduct the business in an orderly and efficient manner. Through her resourcefulness and perseverance Esther has been acting as a generalist adapting to new topics and challenges faced by the company since its inception. By building an efficient personnel structure, she has allowed the company to grow through trust and delegation. In addition to her duties in daily operations, she participates in business strategy, finance, legal, public relations, and client satisfaction. Thanks to her natural ability in project planning, efficiency and human touch, Esther knows how to manage the teams and steer the company towards achieving its objectives. Ever since creating Brain Finance, Esther’s vision has been to offer modern, easy-to-use, and accessible financial services to every Canadian and nothing can stop her in making this vision become reality.

Responsible for the development, planning and execution of a comprehensive Open Banking strategy to position Axway as the leading solution provider in the space. Coordinates efforts across teams within the organisation, from marketing to sales to product, in order to ensure common strategic alignment and complementary messaging. A member of the Catalyst team at Axway, dedicated to providing global thought leadership in the realm of APIs, integration technologies and digital transformation.

Gerry was President and CEO of Payments Canada, where he oversaw changes to its governance and board structure, developed a strategy to modernize Canada’s payments systems, tripled the size and capacity of the organization to deliver on the strategy, brought the industry together to establish a collective vision and roadmap for the future and oversaw the implementation of the first key changes.

Prior to that, Gerry held a number of executive roles at the Bank of Canada, including Chief of Currency, where he was responsible for Canada’s new polymer banknote series, Chief of Banking Operations, where he led the redevelopment of the core banking systems, and Chief of Corporate Services, where he led the transformation of internal corporate functions and services. Gerry has been a member of the International Council of Payment Association Chief Executives, a founding member of P7, a group of 11 Asia Pacific payment companies, and the chair of the Central Bank Counterfeit Deterrence Group, comprised of 32 countries working together to combat currency fraud.

Gerry currently works as a Strategic Advisor at Tata Consultancy Services and advises a number of other companies.

Gilles Ubaghs is a Strategic Advisor with Aite-Novarica Group’s Commercial Banking practice where he is focused on business to business and commercial payments and the role that digital transformation is having across the enterprise and broader financial services sector. This includes a range of horizontal industry wide topic areas, such as the role of shifting payment regulations, fintech’s and artificial intelligence, as well as more tactical granular topics such as commercial cards, and payment clearing and settlement systems.

Gilles brings over 15 years of experience in the analysis and financial services space creating a range of syndicated off the shelf, and bespoke consulting projects for a wide array of clients at the enterprise, vendor, investor and regulator level internationally. Gilles has direct professional experience in European, Asia Pacific and North American markets and always aims to bring local context into global payments issues.

Prior to joining Aite Gilles was a Principal Analyst with Ovum where he helped to build up its retail payments practice across a range of key topics. Originally from Belgium but raised in the US, Gilles is fully fluent in French and English. Gilles holds a bachelors’ degree in Social Anthropology from the London School of Economics and is currently based in beautiful Toronto, Canada.

Hanna is a compliance and risk strategist that has worked for a wide range of financial institutions from big banks to early stage startups. Hanna has successfully led global regulatory change projects on Open Banking, AML and more for the Big 5 banks in Canada on regulations that impact operations in APAC, UK, EU and the US.

Hanna has also advised fintechs on go to market strategies such as designing compliant business models and products. Hanna is currently at Wealthsimple and leads the launch of new products such as Wealthsimple Cash, a hybrid high interest saving and spending account and Wealthsimple Crypto, the first registered dealer in North America approved to buy/sell and hold crypto for clients.

Hanna is also a board member at Open Banking Initiative Canada (OBIC) and represents the fintech voice in advocating for an Open Banking Framework in Canada.

Holly Thomas is a Senior Research and Policy Officer within the Strategic Policy division of the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada (FCAC). She is responsible for monitoring and evaluating trends and issues that may have an impact on financial consumers, conducting research, and contributing to financial sector policy discussions. Her key files include modernization in banking and payments, including open banking.

Prior to joining FCAC in 2015, Dr. Thomas worked as a sessional lecturer at the University of Ottawa and Carleton University, as well as a large financial institution in several frontline positions. She holds a PhD in Sociology from Carleton University.

James has been Banking Reporter for Report on Business since 2017, covering the country’s largest banks, other prominent financial services firms and fintechs. Over 14 years reporting for The Globe, he’s covered media, higher education, cultural policy and news, and written for both the editorial page and the Toronto section. He has won a SABEW Canada Best in Business Award and the Edward Goff Penny Memorial Prize.

Jason Chomik, a seasoned Canadian technology executive who has been active in the payments and digital transformation space for over 25 years. Jason is the Director of the FDX Canada working group to cultivate a culture of collaboration, communication, and technical inclusiveness within FDX between different market segments of the Canadian financial services ecosystem. Jason also serves as the primary FDX resource to FDX Canada members to make the FDX workflow more digestible, and to ensure that all FDX Canada members, regardless of firm size or resources, have the ability to meaningfully participate in FDX technical standards development.

Jeff Brown is the Head of Small and Medium Business Strategy & Innovation at Equifax Canada. He has a passion for educating and advising fortune 500 companies on commercial credit practices, and working with them to empower the small businesses that leverage their goods and services. He has been a driving force for commercial and small business credit at Equifax Canada since 2016. His results are driven by partner engagement, technology, and innovation designed to empower Canada’s small businesses.

Jeff Brown est chef de la stratégie et de l’innovation, petites et moyennes entreprises, à Equifax Canada. Il se passionne en matière d’éducation et de conseils aux entreprises du palmarès Fortune 500 concernant les pratiques liées au crédit commercial, en travaillant avec eux afin d’outiller les petites entreprises qui tirent profit de leurs biens et services. Depuis 2016, il représente l’élément moteur du crédit commercial et du crédit aux petites entreprises chez Equifax Canada. Ses résultats sont stimulés par l’engagement envers les partenaires, et par la technologie et l’innovation inventées pour outiller les petites entreprises au Canada.

Jennifer Reynolds is the President & CEO of Toronto Finance International (TFI), a public-private partnership whose mission is to promote and develop Toronto’s financial services sector, and to establish its prominence as a leading global financial centre.

Jennifer’s 20-year career in the financial services industry has included senior roles in investment banking, venture capital, and global risk management. Prior to joining TFI, Jennifer was the President & CEO of Women in Capital Markets (WCM), Canada’s largest industry association and advocacy group for women in the financial sector.

Jennifer is a Director on the Board of Citibank Canada, Director on the Board of the Canada Development Investment Corporation (“CDEV”), Director on the Board of Women’s College Hospital Foundation, and Director on the Board of Tourism Toronto. She is also a former Member of the Ontario Venture Capital Fund Advisory Committee, former Chair of the Board of Advisors of the Microskills Business Incubator, and former Director on the Board of Studio 180, an independent, Toronto-based theatre company. In 2015 and 2017, she was named a Women’s Executive Network (WXN) Canada’s Most Powerful Women: Top 100 Award Winner.

Jennifer is a graduate of the Harvard Business School Women’s Leadership program, and she received her MBA from McGill University, as well as a Bachelor of Arts with a double major in Economics and Political Science from McGill University. Jennifer also holds the Institute of Corporate Directors Designation, ICD.D.

John MacKinlay is a senior executive in the financial services  arena. He focuses on Fintech, Payments and Innovative Lending products’ space. John has 25 years of experience in the IT and Financial Services industries as an entrepreneur, executive, investor, senior advisor and board member.

John led the Financial Services platform for OMERS Growth Equity undertaking investments in technology enabled Financial Services firms and developing the thesis and strategy around growth. John previously led PwC Canada’s Financial Services Consulting Practice, corporate development for global banks and the FS Strategy Practice for IBM Canada.

Julia Szadkowski (she/her) is the Vice-President of Legal and General Counsel of Equifax Canada, a data, analytics and technology company that is also a registered Canadian credit agency. Her responsibilities include managing a diverse team of professionals providing the day-to-day commercial corporate legal needs of the organization. Julia believes that successful legal leadership begins with empathetic people management and mentorship to foster an environment that enables sound judgment, understanding business needs and seeking strategies to mitigate risk while providing technically excellent legal advice. Her varied legal practice and areas of expertise includes: contract drafting, negotiation, technology, IP, marketing, privacy, compliance and consumer relations. Julia is a legal professional with 15 years experience and prior to working at Equifax she began her career in private practice with a commercial litigation focus before quickly making the leap in-house in the insurance industry. She holds a B.A. (hons) in Political Science from Brock University and a J.D. from Osgoode Hall. She is as passionate about her work as she is her family. When she is not working, you can find her, her husband and two little girls at their cottage by the campfire, canoeing, hiking, swimming, sledding or skating (depending on the weather).

Julie is Senior Compliance Officer, Consumer Advocacy at Equifax Canada and an established authority on consumer credit. A self-described “credit score dork”, Julie is often recognized for her ability to convey the complexities of credit scores while engaging her audience with humour and analogies. Within Equifax, she is focused on the fair treatment of Canadian consumers in compliance with applicable legislation. Julie represents the consumer perspective both inside Equifax as well as in discussion with customers, regulators and media.

Julie’s live media appearances include BNN Bloomberg TV as well several radio and podcast interviews across Canada. She has written popular articles on credit for MoneySense and has been quoted in many print/online media outlets including The Globe and Mail, HuffPost, Bloomberg News, Financial Post, CBC and Narcity.

Julie claims to actually enjoy talking about credit scores and is passionate about helping Canadians build credit confidence.

Julie Lévesque was appointed Executive Vice-President – Information Technology in June 2020. As such, she is responsible for implementing the Bank’s technological strategy. Ms. Lévesque is also a member of National Bank’s Office of the President.

At the time of her appointment, Julie Lévesque was acting as Senior Vice-President – IT Delivery Strategy at National Bank. Previously, she spent three years working for the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board as Managing Director and Head of System and Data Delivery, Technology. Ms. Lévesque worked at National Bank from 2005 to 2016, where she held various various management roles in IT, including Vice-President – IT Delivery Risk, Finances, Capital Market and Human Resources.

With over 25 years of experience in information technology, Julie Lévesque has in-depth knowledge of corporate IT environments and infrastructure. Her leadership style is based on collaboration, trust, partnership and cross-sector teamwork. Her passion for innovation and emerging technology means she quickly grasps the issues involved and excels at explaining concepts in business terms.

Ms. Lévesque has an Executive MBA (EMBA) from McGill-HEC Montréal.

As Chief Operating Officer of Payments Canada, Justin led efforts to modernize Canada’s core payments systems, transformed the organization into a payments centre of excellence and helped to define the emerging PayTech industry. As CEO for one of these PayTechs, he established a new strategic path for the $50M business.

Justin has worked closely with major regulatory agencies on the payments file and has appeared as a witness to both Senate and Commons Committees, as well as the House of Lords in the UK. His earlier career in retail banking and international financial services made a foundational contribution to the change that he now effects.

Justin is an experienced entrepreneur – having been a co-founder in a retail eyewear company with 28 stores in Canada and the UK, an indoor farm in Ontario, rooftop commercial rooftop solar development and a commercial kitchen services firm. He has experience raising funds from private equity and has worked on multiple investment banking transactions, on both buy and sell sides.

Karen Budahazy is an experienced Senior Executive in the financial services industry. She has held leadership roles at Givex and InComm prior to joining the payments team at Peoples Group as Vice President, Digital Enablement and Issuing. She currently serves as the Chair for the Canadian Prepaid Providers Organization.

In his role as Head of Banking, Financial Services & Insurance (BFSI) for Canada, Manmeet is responsible for TCS’ BFSI business in Canada.

With over two decades experience, Manmeet has proven success in building lasting relationships, meeting customer goals, and establishing diversified global delivery teams.

During his 25 year tenure with TCS, he has held many key leadership positions spanning client delivery, business development, P&L accountability, and leading large teams both in Canada and the US.

Matt MacNeil is the Director of Standards and Technology at the CIO Strategy council and has over 20 years’ experience in the standards, certification and management consulting.  The bulk of his career has been with the British Standards Institution (BSI) where his focus was Information Security, IT and Risk standards.

Mayank Mishra is the Global Head of Online Banking and Connectivity Services, at Citi’s Treasury and Trade Solutions (TTS) business. Mayank Mishra is responsible for leading Digitization, Client Experience and Productivity initiatives for online payments and other Treasury and Trade Solutions across the global footprint of 95+ countries through the use of Industry leading Digital platforms. In this role Mayank Mishra and his team works with the clients to drive Strategy, Execution and commercialization of CitiDirect BE, Citi’s award winning Online Banking platform. This platform CitiDirect BE provides a wide range of services across Payments, Receivables, Liquidity, Trade and Supplier Finance supporting all the Citi Treasury and Trade Solutions markets globally. Mayank Mishra is also responsible for Streamlining Corporate to Bank payment and information flows through integration with clients’ systems such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Treasury Management solutions. Mayank Mishra’s priorities include enhanced overall experience through creation of industry leading Online Banking and Connectivity capabilities. Mayank Mishra has over 25 years of industry experience, with over 12 years in leading Digital Services in Online Payments space. Mayank Mishra holds a Master’s degree in Computer Science and currently resides in New York City. He is an avid golfer and a tennis enthusiast.

Michelle is the CEO & founder of FINAVATOR an award winning FinTech and Payments Consultancy. She is also a strategic advisor, a Money 20/20 Rise Up alumni, a Women in Payments Global Council Member, the Membership Chair at CPPO (Canadian Prepaid Providers Organization), a Payment Advisor at NCFA (National Crowdfunding and FinTech Association of Canada), and a Board Member at OBIC (Open Banking Initiative of Canada).

Mitch Koczerginski is a Canadian lawyer with a practice focused on advising clients on all aspects of privacy law. Mitch advises and represents clients in connection with privacy and data breaches involving payment card information, personal information, health information and sensitive business information. Mitch routinely drafts and reviews privacy policies, conducts privacy impact assessments and responds to access to information requests. Mitch also handles submissions to provincial privacy regulators as well as the Privacy Commissioner of Canada on a variety of matters, including breach reporting and access to information appeals.

Paul Franklin is Executive General Manager, Consumer Data Right at the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).  He joined the ACCC in January 2020 to lead the implementation of Australia’s Consumer Data Right, which for the banking sector is known as ‘Open Banking’.

Prior to joining the ACCC Paul spent more than twenty years working in payments and financial services, including innovation in domestic and international payments.  He worked on the design and development of Australia’s New Payments Platform, and is a former Non-Executive Director and Deputy Chair of the Australian Payments Network (AusPayNet).

Peter is the Vice President, SMB Sales and Marketing for Staples Canada. He is an experienced marketing, sales and eCommerce leader with a demonstrated track record of success across multiple organizations and industries primarily in the B2B space. In his current role, Peter is charged with building a dedicated B2B team and strategy to rapidly grow Staples leadership position in the small business space. Functions in his portfolio include sales, business development, credit solutions, membership development, pricing, CRM and marketing. He has created a specialized inside sales team strategy designed around customer lifecycle, industry verticals and product expertise. Responsible for leading and motivating a diverse team of 100+ sales and head office associates.

Ram V is VP and Chief Technology Officer for TCS’s Banking, Financial Services, and Insurance (BFSI) business unit worldwide. He is the custodian of the TCS’s BFSI Innovation Lab and works with TCS labs and customers worldwide to incubate innovation ideas from inception to execution.

During the course of his 30+ years with TCS, He has led several large mission-critical transformation implementations for TCS‘s BFSI clients across the globe. Two of the TCS implementations that he has led have won “Banker Technology Awards” from the prestigious UK based Financial Times Group – Banker Magazine highlighting the complexity & business value delivered to the clients.

Roy possesses over 20 years of experience in various leadership roles in Fintech, managing consultancy, and other entrepreneurial pursuits around the world.

Prior to joining MaRS, Roy was the founding Chief Technology Officer at Lendified, a respected small business lending Fintech company, and was a co-founder of Alpha Insights, a data and analytics strategy consultancy for the Financial Services industry. Previously, Roy was CEO of Bentley & Co. Limited in New York and Shanghai, and has held management and consulting positions at companies including BCE Emergis, CA Technologies, and Accenture.

Roy is a native Mandarin Chinese and English speaker, and graduated with an honours degree in computer science and economics from the University of Toronto.

Saba Shariff is an acknowledged leader at Symcor Inc., a leading provider of business processing and data management services, supporting major banks, insurance, retail, and telecommunications companies in Canada. As Head of New Product Development and Innovation, Saba leads a passionate team of professionals in designing new and exciting ways to solve real customer problems and leverage data to both improve today’s services and discover new ones. With over 20 years of experience in IT and Product, Saba is a frequent public speaker in the private and public sector on topics such as Collaborations or Partnerships in Canada, and Breaking Stereotypes in Business Technology Management. In her spare time, Saba enjoys being active while managing the joys and tribulations of raising a teenage son.

Scott Farrell is a senior partner of King & Wood Mallesons with more than 20 years’ experience in financial markets, financial systems and financial technology law, advising startups, market participants, financial system operators, regulators and governments in Australia and the Indo-Pacific.  Scott has given many years of service to the public and private sector in advising on, and guiding, regulatory and legal change in the financial market and system landscape, including in connection with financial technology. Scott has chaired the Australian Government’s FinTech Advisory Group and is on the Australian Government’s advisory board for innovation, research and science matters.  Scott led the two inquiries for the Australian Government which designed, and developed, the framework for open banking and Australia’s Consumer Data Right and recently chaired the review into the regulatory architecture of Australia’s payments system.

With over 25 years of experience in digital strategy and transformation, Stéphane has made a name for himself as a key player in the evolution of Canada’s digital landscape.

Prior to working at National Bank of Canada, Stephane was active in the media industry where he led numerous digital transformation programs for the Sun Media Corporation, the National Film Board of Canada and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Stephane holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Communications and Digital Media from the University of Quebec in Montréal (UQAM).

Sue is President of Equifax Canada where she leads a team of over 500 employees primarily in Toronto and Montreal office locations. Sue has over 25 years of experience in commercial and retail banking and digital payment technology.

Prior to joining Equifax in late November 2020, Sue served as Senior Vice President, Core, Digital and New Payments at Mastercard Canada; Chief Commercial Officer at Payments Canada; Canada Country Manager and Group Head at D+H (now Finastra) and held Senior Vice President roles at HSBC and Bank of America, including in Retail Banking and Wealth Management, Commercial Banking and Global Transaction Banking.

Sue is currently a board member of Home Capital Group and sits as an Advisory Board Member for Women in Payments. Her previous Board experience includes Canada Payments Association (now Payments Canada), BC Women’s Hospital Foundation and Nature Conservancy of Canada.

Sue is an award recipient of the ‘Top 100: Canada’s Most Powerful Women’. She has an MBA in Finance and International Business from the Schulich School of Business and is also an Institute Certified Director (ICD.D) of the Institute of Corporate Directors. Sue lives in Toronto.

Sumee is the AVP, Open Banking at TD within the Digital Channels group and is responsible for overseeing TD’s role in the rapidly-evolving Open Banking ecosystem. Sumee has worked in the Financial Services Sector for over 7 years with a focus on emerging technologies, open banking, and digital identity. Prior to her tenure at TD, Sumee worked at Microsoft and launched a wide range of enterprise, developer and customer-facing software products.

Yassir leads Equifax Canada’s digital innovation practice, enabling customers to bring consumer-centric solutions to market leveraging Equifax data and capabilities, and is credited with introducing Equifax’s mortgage prequalification service in Canada. Prior to joining Equifax, Yassir worked across 3 of Canada’s largest banks for 17 years, where most of his experience was in Retail Deposits where he led and worked on consumer-centric programs including streamlined account onboarding, simplified product suite and behaviour linked rewards. Yassir is a strong believer in the enhanced value and choice that deposit account insights enable for consumers, and he views Open Banking as a practical and secure framework through which this value and choice can be best realized.