The much awaited 6th edition of World Cards and Payments Summit commenced today at the Habtoor Grand Beach Resort & Spa Hotel
, with the opening speech from the chair - Ugo Bechis, Chairman Cards of European Payment Council. Bechis also addressed the audience in an exclusive speaker presentation later, where he addressed issues on the market evolution, change in operational models and new players in the field of e-Payments

Sachin Bountra, Industry Payment& Retail Banking Expert, conducted the first session of the day, where he focused on “The Rise of FinTech: Imperatives for Payments & Retail Banking”. A glimpse of the next 5 years in payment business, with emphasis on Innovation, Transformation and Growth was elaborated by Devendar Agarwal, Director and Business Head (Credit Cards, Loans & Mortgages) – Middle East & Africa - Citibank.

The GURU panel discussion entitled “Industry Trends and Major Challenges – What’s next?”, brainstormed and addressed key issues in the industry such as: What is driving the transformation of the cards & payments ecosystems, How to use innovation as a business strategy and monetise new technologies for the future, What shall be the game changer for the future of cards & payments race

This panel was moderated by Ugo Bechis and joined by Sachin Bountra, Alex Mifsud, CEO and Co-Founder
of Ixaris Systems Ltd and Aaron Oliver, Head of Emerging Payments (Middle East & Africa)
- MasterCard. Aaron Oliver, Head of Emerging Payments (Middle East & Africa) - MasterCard in his presentation emphasised on Creative & Unique innovations, as a need to emerge as a industry leader. “New Prepaid Opportunities: Case Studies from Europe, Middle East & Africa” will be elaborated and explained by Alex Mifsud, CEO and Co-Founderof Ixaris Systems Ltd.

Post lunch the summit resumed with the speech from the chair - Robert Courtneidge, Global Head of Cards & Payments- Locke Lord (UK) LLP, followed by a session by Sachin Kumar, Senior Manager (Credit Cards Product & Portfolio Management)- Saudi Hollandi Bank, on the scope and potential of introducing innovative valued added solutions for pricing strategies and reducing operational cost.

Darpan Shah, Deputy Vice President – Global Remittance at Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency, enlightened the audience about the legal and regulatory framework of cards & payments operations, while the need and importance of customer centric product development was explained by Abhishek Saha, Senior Vice President & Head of Credit Cards - Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank.

The day concluded with a panel discussion titled “ Heart of Future Payments – Customer being the top priority”, which was moderated by Robert Courtneidge and joined by Sachin Kumar, Sammy Tuffaha, Director - Mobile Commerceat Etisalat and Philip Byrne, Head of Cards at Commercial Bank International.

Tomorrow, the second day of the conference will witness intriguing panel discussiona dn speaker presentations from companies such as National Bank of Oman, Standard Chartered Bank, IndusInd Bank, Qatar National Bank, Etisalat, Locke Lord (UK) LLP and more. Ixaris is the Silver Sponsor of this conference and showcased their solutions and services benefiting the cards and payments industry.