What makes a payments business successful today? Interview with Credorax

Aviram Shemer is the Chief Financial Officer and Chief Risk Officer of Credorax. Prior to joining the company, Aviram was CFO of Aladdin Knowledge Systems, where he played a significant role in its merger with SafeNet Holding, and served as CFO at PowerDsine before it was acquired for over USD 250 million.

Hello Aviram. Could you describe your role at Credorax?

My role at Credorax is to oversee the financial and risk aspects of the company. Given that we are a licensed merchant bank in addition to being a payments gateway, there is a lot of responsibility that comes with that! I have to manage the cashflow of Credorax, as well as that of our merchants. In addition, I’m responsible for our company’s regulatory compliance, which is crucial to our ability to serve our customers, not to mention our relationships with the card schemes.

I work from my house in Boston, so I start my day very early to work with my colleagues in Malta and Israel. Once they get to the end of their working days, I get to my ongoing issues. Because I focus on finance and risk, 70% of my day is problem solving and the remaining 30% is thinking about what can go wrong!

What does a payments company need to be successful nowadays?

Execution, execution, execution. You can have a truly unique differentiator, or a successful sales team, or brilliant relationship with customers, but it doesn’t mean anything if your product doesn’t work like it should and you don’t deliver the results.

I believe that every company in fintech nowadays needs to be at the top of its game – with ecommerce ramping up globally, business can no longer afford to have slow payment pages or downtime. This is a gigantic space experiencing disruption almost every day, and a successful payments company must deliver strong technology and constant innovations.

Getting ready for Strong Customer Authentication is the hot topic right now. Are successful companies prepared for SCA?

They should be! But of course it’s easier said than done - there are a lot of challenges in navigating this regulation and it requires a lot of resources to resolve them. Right now, I think putting a strong 3D Secure solution in place is the best bet for merchants – it’s the best mechanism to ensure SCA compliance. At Credorax, we offer a product called Smart 3DS, which includes an optimisation engine that analyses transactions against a series of rules and decides whether to apply 3D Secure authentication. It can help merchants make the best use of 3D Secure to achieve compliance and maximise approvals.

What is the real impact on the digital payments ecosystem of SCA implementation?

I recently came across some research that noted that failure to comply with SCA requirements could cost merchants a whopping EUR 57 billion in card abandonments. So, at a first glance, this regulation might appear to be negative, but it’s important to remember that regulation is intended to make things better for everyone. PSD2 and SCA were developed to protect customers, merchants and banks from fraud. If the industry applies these new requirements properly, we should see increases in approvals and conversion rates, as well as less friction in the customer experience.

How do you think the world of payments will look like in ten years?

Payments will become ubiquitous. The form factor of a card is going to vanish, and people will be paying with things that they own and that surround them – your phone, your face, your social identity. We are already seeing this come to reality.

If you want a glimpse into the future of payments, just look at other markets that have gone through a major consolidation. For example, TV or data storage, these industries used to be very fragmented and now they are run by a few giants. I believe that we will be seeing a lot of consolidations in the payments industry in the near future, and in ten years there will be less than 10 companies controlling the whole payments market. Things are already moving in that direction!

About Aviram Shemer

Aviram brings to Credorax vast experience and high-level management skills. Prior to joining the company, he served as CFO of Aladdin Knowledge systems (Nasdaq: ALDN), where he played a significant role in its merger with SafeNet Holding. Previously, Aviram was CFO at PowerDsine (Nasdaq: PDSN), acquired by Microsemi Inc. (Nasdaq: MSCC) for over USD 250 million, and before that, Vice President of Finance at Alvarion Ltd. (Nasdaq: ALVR), a leading provider of wireless broadband solutions. Aviram is a CPA and holds a B.A. in Accounting and Economics in addition to an MBA specialising in Finance and Accounting.

About Credorax

Credorax is a licensed NextGen merchant acquiring bank providing cross-border processing for ecommerce and omni-channel payments. Our core gateway technology, Source^TM, has been developed in-house to provide a streamlined payments experience so smart, that merchants can reach their full business potential simply by better managing their payments. Credorax merchants process in over 120 currencies, accept a wide range of alternative payment methods, and get paid in their currency of choice. Our merchants also enjoy best-in-class approval rate optimisation, advanced fraud protection, business intelligence and a host of other value-added services and products adding up to a payments experience unlike any other. Visit www.credorax.com to learn more.