We are shaping the fintech and mobile economy. The mobile ecosystem is at the heart of fintech and GSMA members and partners have seen great value in coming together to review areas of common interest.
The GSMA FinTech & Mobile Economy Forum community has a strategic priority to support partners to explore areas of common interest and key issues, monitor insights and share use studies, create new collaborative opportunities, and drive exciting innovative projects.
By promoting agile working group opportunities, we can support new solutions in line with the GSMA Foundry such as :
- Creating new propositions to power financial inclusion by entering or disrupting the fintech marketplace
- Delivering enterprise solutions to the fintech vertical to support challenges and threats
- Fintech products to help run business as usual operations – banking, payments, mobile insurance

Our working model of the forum forms a key part of upcoming GSMA events strategy including MWC, M360 and FinTech Forum Meetings and as a forum member we will provide the latest opportunities to showcase your solutions and developments.
Based on GSMA standard operating model of supporting the mobile eco-system to explore opportunities, with the added support of GSMA Foundry to create a proof of concepts, accelerate and scale solutions.
We will hold virtual and in-person events throughout the year scheduled around GSMA events. For full details about the Terms of Reference click here.
Join the forum today
If you would like to join the FinTech & Mobile Economy Forum to collaborate, share ideas and fintech developments from your organisation, we would like to hear from you.
Simply share your details on the form below and our team will be in touch.
Please note that this forum is open to all GSMA Members. If you would like to learn more about becoming a GSMA Member, please contact fintech@gsma.com.
Previous Events
Launched in 2022, the GSMA FinTech Forum hosted three successful meetings with super case studies from our forum members.
Following the success at MWC Barcelona including the GSMA Strategy Group and our FinTech Summit on the Industry City Stage, we shared some of the insights from speakers including Accenture, Deutsche Telecom, Celo and Mawari.
Speaker shared an insight into the current FinTech landscape including metaverse, digital assets and services that are being developed around the globe.
Speakers

Richard Cockle
Head of IoT, Identity and Big Data, GSMA
Richard heads an international team at the GSMA and is responsible for developing new innovative products and services beyond the core network in IoT, Identity and Big Data for the mobile ecosystem.
As the key lead for GSMA engagements in the vertical industries, specifically; FinTech, Automotive, Aviation and Manufacturing, Richard has recently launched the GSMA Innovation Foundry, creating a collaborative platform for GSMA members and partners to work together on the major challenges facing the industry.
In addition, Richard is responsible for the GSMA’s Strategy Group which regularly convenes to address strategic topics within the industry and supports the GSMA Board.

Brian Gorman
FinTech Vertical Lead, GSMA
Brian is the FinTech Vertical Lead at GSMA leading activities to enhance collaboration between the Financial Services vertical and the mobile eco-system. This reflects the strategy requested by the GSMA board to get closer to key verticals and better understand their needs.
His career includes product and commercial management in banking and mobile telecoms including O2, Lloyds and Barclays. As well as Telecomms, heading up the Digital Product team, Commerce, at Telefonica UK.

Brian J. Smyth
Director – Communications & Media, Innovation, Accenture
Brian leads innovation for Accenture’s Communications and Media Industry globally with a focus on the metaverse, Web3 and the future of the internet. He has a passion for technology since receiving a Sega Megadrive as a child and loves that he gets to combine this with solving for human needs, working with clients to ignite change in The Dock, Accenture’s global R&D and Innovation centre in Dublin, which he helped set up in 2016. Over the past 15 years Brian has helped leading organisations to expand globally, accelerate product development cycles and embed a culture of innovation. Outside of Accenture, Brian served as Irish President of Junior Chamber International, the worldwide leadership development organisation and sits on the Governing Authority of his alma mater, Dublin City University.

Luis Ramirez
Founder and CEO, Mawari
Luis is the Founder and CEO of Mawari. In this role, his mission is to enable Synthetic Reality for everyone. He is committed to experimenting and developing with emerging technologies such as 5G, cloud rendering and streaming, in order to build a patent pending 3D Streaming CODEC for Mawari 3DXR Content Streaming Platform, a next-generation XR distribution technology for the metaverse.
Mawari’s proprietary CODEC enables the highest visual quality to be streamed to mobile XR Devices by substantially lowering the heavy processing requirements of rich interactive and ultra-realistic 3D content like real-time digital humans, reducing cost, data size and battery consumption while unlocking scalability.
Prior to Mawari, he spearheaded and co-founded the Japanese version of MUTEK, a world-renowned festival dedicated to the dissemination and development of digital creativity in sound, music, and audio-visual art. He also served as a Global Head of Marketing at MUSIC Tribe, one of the world’s largest holding companies for pro audio and music instruments.

Julia Carbajal
Global Head of Telecom & Media, celo
Julia is a strategy and business development executive, with over 20 years of experience within blue-chip organizations specializing in Telecom & Media, blockchain, crypto, and start-up ecosystems. Recognized as an industry thought leader due to entrepreneurial and business-focused mindset, Julia has cultivated an international profile by supporting projects across Europe, UK, the USA, Middle East, and Southeast Asia. Julia is currently the Global Head of Telecom & Media strategic partnerships at cLabs, working on Celo, a mobile first L1 open-source blockchain.

Jens Herrmann
Senior Expert Corporate Strategy, Deutsche Telekom
Innovation and technology is a passion for Jens, Senior Expert Corporate Strategy at Deutsche Telekom. Being in the telco business for more than 18 years now, he combines his technology and business background with entrepreneurship, foresight topics, as well as strategy and investment work. Jens is driving and advising major blockchain and crypto related developments at DT.

Andrew Walker
Senior Managing Director, Global Communications & Media Industry Lead, Accenture
As Accenture’s Communications and Media Industry Leader, Andy is responsible for the strategy, offerings, and business, as well as, the network of more than fifty thousand professionals who serve our Media and Communications clients around the world.
Andy has consulted to Communications, Media and High Tech clients for more than 20 years, and has advised leaders across the industry on issues ranging from their fiber strategy to the profitability of their customers & products to margin improvement efforts. As well, Andy has been an advisor on multiple mergers, acquisitions and divestitures across the industry, and has helped a number of clients launch new businesses, including new wireless businesses, technology services businesses, and segment specific businesses.
Prior to his career in consulting, Andy spent 4 years serving as a policy advisor to several Members of Congress who served on the House Telecommunications Committee. During this time, he worked on a number of efforts related to the liberalization of the U.S. telecom market. He is a frequent speaker at conferences, and has published in the M&A Journal, the Journal of Telecommunications, CFO.com and WSJ.com, among others.
Building on the success of FinTech Forum Meeting #1, our guest speakers included Citi, Vodafone and Worldpay from FIS.
We discussed:
– The trends in digital currencies including the huge interest in Central Bank Digital Currencies – What are they and the benefits? – Which central banks have projects? What do they mean for the mobile eco-system?
– How to utilise network insights to help FinTech fight fraud with collaborative strategies
Our Speakers

Brian Gorman
FinTech Vertical Lead, GSMA
Brian is the FinTech Vertical Lead at GSMA leading activities to enhance collaboration between the Financial Services vertical and the mobile eco-system. This reflects the strategy requested by the GSMA board to get closer to key verticals and better understand their needs.
His career includes product and commercial management in banking and mobile telecoms including O2, Lloyds and Barclays. As well as Telecomms, heading up the Digital Product team, Commerce, at Telefonica UK.

Fraser King
Global Head of Vodafone Identity Hub, Vodafone Group
Fraser is a founding member of Vodafone’s Big Data and Advanced Analytics business unit and now heads up commercial strategy for Vodafone’s Mobile Identity portfolio globally. Fraser thrives on challenging the norm, burning the rulebook and realising the profound possibilities technology creates to improve human life.

Julia Demidova
Head of CBDC Strategy, Worldpay from FIS
Julia is focusing on CBDC strategy, design principles, assessing capabilities & technologies, and creating the CBDC a suite of products and services for FIS to support full payments value chain. How CBDCs could uplift the nations, whether through financial inclusion, financial deepening and digitization. Julia is also responsible for developing, maintaining, and strengthening of relationship with central banks, regulators, and policy makers and private sector institutions on the topic of CBDC and supporting full payments value chain, including central infrastructure and applications.
Julia worked on several flagship CBDC projects with central banks and other financial market infrastructure players. Julia also contributes to CBDC and digital assets point of views and consultation responses.
In 2018, Julia joined OMFIF a central bank think-tank based in London as a Director of Fintech & Private Markets. In 2020 Julia launched OMFIF’s Digital Monetary Institute (DMI) an independent platform for convening central banks on CBDCs, digital payments, the DLT and blockchain.
In 2013, Julia joined a single-family office in London. Julia was responsible for marketing and analysis of funds and hedge funds, before moving to the investor relations department. Here she was responsible for fundraising and marketing for project finance, private equity and venture capital co-investments. Julia has developed several significant relationships with family offices, sovereign funds and international commercial and development banks in Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
Julia holds a BA (Hons) from EBS London in International Business and Finance. She speaks English, German and Arabic.

Sandip Patil
Regional Head of Liquidity Management Services, Citi Asia Pacific
Sandip is Regional Head of Liquidity Management Services for the Treasury and Trade Solutions (TTS) in Asia-pacific, a business unit of Citi’s Institutional Clients Group. TTS is Citi’s core business, offering award-winning integrated cash management and trade solutions to multinational corporations, financial institutions and public sector organizations across Citi’s Global network including 16 countries in Asia Pacific.
Based in Hong Kong, Sandip is responsible for providing an integrated suite of Citi’s Liquidity and Investments solutions across all 16 countries in Asia-pacific. These services are at the core of supporting clients’ Commercial and Treasury activities with an aim to optimize Liquidity and Vehicle using Innovative Solutions. He is also responsible for developing Digital Assets Strategy for LMS business. This business oversees USD 135 Bn of Client Deposits earned through Liquidity and Payment Structures. He is a member of balance sheet and various risk committees at Citi.
Sandip started with Citi as a Management Associate and in the last 26 years, he has held numerous positions in India, Thailand as well in Citi’s regional office in Hong Kong. His experience spans across Sales and Client Management, Product Management, Risk Management as well as eBusiness Development functions both, locally and regionally. Prior to current role, Sandip was the Asia Sales Head for Financial Institutions Business as well as Asia Business Head for Payments, Receivables and Channels Services for TTS Asia.
Sandip holds a Master of Management Studies as well as a Bachelor of Chemical Engineering Degree from University of Mumbai, India. He was a Government of India’s National Merit Scholar and has received numerous awards including Citi’s prestigious Global Chairman’s Club award.
In our third meeting, we brought together partners to share key insights and case studies that are accelerating the growth of fintech adoption including the creation of brilliant solutions and services especially within the Africa region.
Our session deep-dived into:
– The VodaPay Super-app that is revolutionising South Africa’s ecommerce landscape – Vodacom Financial Services
– Accelerating growth in the M-Pesa ecosystem through an open API strategy – M-Pesa Africa
– Leveraging AI and alternative data analytics to create scalable digital lending programs – Yabx and MTN Zambia

Samuel Mutua
Executive Head of Department, Business Payments, M-Pesa Africa
Passionate not only about driving financial inclusion but also on growing financial health, Sammy has had a career spanning +15 years in telecommunication, banking, and financial services with this objective in mind.
He has been at the fore front of championing digitization across multiple industries to enhance access to financial services like credit, savings investments, remittance, and insurance. He knows the mission is far from done and focuses on creating positive impact in the lives of every day Africans by working on building collaborative co-creative environments across different sectors to get the best minds to deliver African Born solutions to African problems.
He worked in various leaderships roles in different institutions including NCBA Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, Airtel, and Visa inc. before finally joining M-Pesa Africa as the Executive head of Business Payments in 2021.

Marco Torrente
Executive Head of Marketing and Digital, Vodacom Financial Services
Marco Torrente is the Executive Head of the Marketing and Digital Department as well as a member of the Executive Leadership at Vodacom Financial Services.
Marco’s professional experience includes Business Intelligence, Financial Technology, Organisational Effectiveness, Product UX & UI, Process Engineering and now, full Marketing and Digital responsibility. His ability to create effective processes, strategies and solutions allows Marco to lead fast paced teams and spearhead innovative and disruptive business propositions.
Marco holds a MSc degree in Management Engineering from the Polytechnic Institute of Turin, Italy.

Puneet Chopra
Chief Growth Officer, YABX
Puneet Chopra is the founding member and Chief Growth Officer at Yabx. He has over fifteen years of experience in the mobile telecommunications and fintech industry across consulting, market expansion and business development. Technology and Innovation have been the core themes and passion across his professional journey of launching greenfield telecom operators, transforming technology stacks and delivering new age solutions to solve real life problems for both B2B and B2B2C.
Yabx is a fintech venture, leveraging technology and analytics to reduce the cost of delivering financial services in a scalable and sustainable manner. Yabx enables banks and micro finance institutions to acquire and service tens of millions of new customers in a pure digital model in partnerships with telecom and other consumer networks.

Pafyako Malema
Manager - Fintech Product and Strategy, MTN Zambia

Brian Gorman
FinTech Vertical Lead, GSMA
Brian is the FinTech Vertical Lead at GSMA leading activities to enhance collaboration between the Financial Services vertical and the mobile eco-system. This reflects the strategy requested by the GSMA board to get closer to key verticals and better understand their needs.
His career includes product and commercial management in banking and mobile telecoms including O2, Lloyds and Barclays. As well as Telecomms, heading up the Digital Product team, Commerce, at Telefonica UK.
After a successful MWC23 Barcelona FinTech Summit, we will be bringing key partners to deep-dive further into the topic of non-core revenue growth, explore new market opportunities and strategies.
Our session deep-dived into:
– Accelerating new revenue streams from fintech – Alipay+
– Collaborating to create rapid speed to market and drive adoption – Huawei and Ethio Telecom presentation

Brian Gorman
FinTech Vertical Lead, GSMA
Brian is the FinTech Vertical Lead at GSMA leading activities to enhance collaboration between the Financial Services vertical and the mobile eco-system. This reflects the strategy requested by the GSMA board to get closer to key verticals and better understand their needs.
His career includes product and commercial management in banking and mobile telecoms including O2, Lloyds and Barclays. As well as Telecomms, heading up the Digital Product team, Commerce, at Telefonica UK.

Li Zhixian
Senior Director, Alipay+ Payment Tech Services, Ant Group
Mr Li is responsible for the Ant Fintech business. He has been with Ant Group for six years and has led 10+ Ant mobile wallet investment initiatives across Asia and the MEA region with a few successful cases. With the combination of local understanding and Ant fintech knowledge, He is also responsible for the post-investment JV performance, helping the management to design business strategy, and organize critical battles by leveraging Alipay technology and operational expertise to ensure the business results. He is also sitting on the board of Telenor Microfinance Bank.

Said Aragaw Ahmed
Ethio Telecom , CMO

Ian Ravenscroft
VP, Huawei Fintech
Our session deep-dived into:
– Global payment trends 2023
– API Marketplace
– GSMA Foundry
– GSMA FinTech update

Brian Gorman
FinTech Vertical Lead, GSMA
Brian is the FinTech Vertical Lead at GSMA leading activities to enhance collaboration between the Financial Services vertical and the mobile eco-system. This reflects the strategy requested by the GSMA board to get closer to key verticals and better understand their needs.
His career includes product and commercial management in banking and mobile telecoms including O2, Lloyds and Barclays. As well as Telecomms, heading up the Digital Product team, Commerce, at Telefonica UK.

Jeff DeLong
Director of Vertical Growth, Worldpay
Jeff DeLong is the Director of Vertical Growth for the Government, Utilities and Telco verticals within FIS’ Merchant Solutions division, Worldpay. Jeff and his team are responsible for FIS’s comprehensive merchant strategy and go to market approach, globally and across channels, in these key verticals.
Prior to joining FIS, Jeff served in numerous leadership roles at Verizon, most recently focused on strategic partnership initiatives within Verizon’s connected vehicle division. While at Verizon, Jeff also served on the board of the company’s ADVANCE employee resource group, whose mission is to promote increased awareness and accessibility for those with disabilities.
Originally from Philadelphia, Jeff is now based in Atlanta and has an MBA from Emory University, as well as a BSM from Tulane University.

Clara Serrano Solsona
Global Product Manager, Telefónica

Waseem Amra
Head of Products and Platforms, Chenosis

Clare Messenger
Global Commercial Head of Fraud Protection Services, JT Group
Clare heads up the Mobile Intelligence division for JT Group- a Tier-1 Telecom Company with over 600 Mobile Network Operator partners worldwide. Working closely with these MNO partners, JT provides network data solutions that protect against identity theft and account takeover and support businesses with SCA. Clare started her career in the media industry heading up commercial teams within the publishing, TV and digital sectors. For over 15 years she has worked in the Telecommunications industry and has led many new strategic projects to drive incremental revenue for Mobile Operators. Clare was a founding member of the UK joint venture Weve- a mobile media and payments business that was owned by Vodafone, TEF and EE. Clare is an expert and avid advocate on using mobile data for fraud prevention and has worked extensively with Mobile Operators globally. Successfully scaling the Mobile Intelligence business for JT has been Clare’s key priority and the ongoing focus is on developing new services and expanding into new markets.

Dianne Doodnath
Principal, Economic Crime - Remote Payment Channels, UK Finance

Richard Cockle
Head of IoT, Identity and Big Data, GSMA
Richard heads an international team at the GSMA and is responsible for developing new innovative products and services beyond the core network in IoT, Identity and Big Data for the mobile ecosystem.
As the key lead for GSMA engagements in the vertical industries, specifically; FinTech, Automotive, Aviation and Manufacturing, Richard has recently launched the GSMA Innovation Foundry, creating a collaborative platform for GSMA members and partners to work together on the major challenges facing the industry.
In addition, Richard is responsible for the GSMA’s Strategy Group which regularly convenes to address strategic topics within the industry and supports the GSMA Board.

Sylviane Gbetibouo-Lee
Growth Strategist - Government, Utilities and Telco, Worldpay
Sylviane Gbetibouo-Lee is a growth strategist for the Government, Utilities and Telco verticals at Worldpay. She currently develops the enterprise merchant strategy and go-to-market approach globally for the Telco vertical.
As a community driven individual, Sylviane founded 3 years ago, a business transformation practice to enable local businesses growth.
Originally from Cote d’Ivoire, Sylviane is now based in Atlanta and has a BBA in Finance from Georgia State University.

Faisal Zia
Foundry Director, GSMA
Faisal Zia is responsible for scaling GSMA Foundry, the innovation wing of the GSMA, which showcases and develops global innovation projects from across the telco ecosystem.
Faisal has over a decade of experience leading tech and telecom projects, encompassing technology strategy and emerging technology including Telco Edge, RCS, Network Economics and previously held roles at EE and Orange Group.
Upcoming Events
FinTech Forum Meeting #7 – November 2023
Join us for the GSMA FinTech Forum Meeting #7 on Thursday 16 November 2023 from 13:00 – 14:30 (GMT) which will bring together partners to share key insights and case studies that are accelerating the growth of fintech adoption including the creation of brilliant solutions and services.
Register Now to Join