Ovanti bolsters US leadership team with three high-profile hires

• Ovanti hires three new senior executives for US BNPL leadership team
• Leaders come from major fintechs and financial services firms including PayPal and Block
• Ovanti says team has commercial, operational and engineering depth to scale quickly in US market

Special Report: Fintech Ovanti has boosted its US BNPL leadership team by appointing three new senior executives with vast experience spanning global payments, merchant partnerships and large-scale technology platforms.

Collectively, the leaders have led strategies at some of the world’s most recognised fintech and financial services companies – including PayPal, Adyen, Nuvei, Afterpay and Block – as well as at major merchants such as Nordstrom, T-Mobile and eBay.

Ovanti (ASX:OVT) said the executive hires signified its commitment to make the investment required to effectively service major merchants who were joining the company and embracing its unique approach to the provision of BNPL services in the US market.

Their combined expertise across commercial partnerships, payments operations and product engineering ensures Ovanti is equipped with the leadership depth required to scale its BNPL offering in the US and deliver better outcomes for merchants, partners and customers alike.

Former Nuvei leader to join Ovanti

Joining Ovanti from Nasdaq-listed payments tech company Nuvei, Barbara Badelt Ford has been appointed senior vice president, commercial.

Badelt Ford most recently served as vice president, global commerce platforms, leading partner strategy across ecommerce, recurring billing and marketplaces.

She managed teams across the Americas and EMEA, scaling Nuvei’s global partner ecosystem and building strategic alliances with system integrators and consultants.

Before Nuvei, Badelt Ford was strategic partnerships lead at Adyen where she built and scaled the financial technology company’s North American partner ecosystem.

At Adyen she negotiated platform integrations, unified commerce partnerships and joint go-to-market strategies with leading retail and ecommerce brands.

Ovanti said Badelt Ford brought deep expertise in commercial partnerships and a proven track record of scaling payments companies through partner, platform and ecosystem strategies – experience that will be central to its US BNPL commercial expansion.

From Nordstrom, T-Mobile, eBay and PayPal to Ovanti

Former director of payments at Nordstrom Daniel Criselego has been appointed senior vice president, merchant & partner operations.

At Nordstrom, Criselego architected and executed the company’s global payments strategy, transforming payments into an omni-channel profit centre and driving consistent incremental revenue growth.

He established, negotiated and implemented strategic partnerships with brands such as American Express, PayPal, Afterpay and Affirm, delivering industry-leading conversion rates and enhanced customer acquisition.

Previously, Criselego directed payment strategy and operations at T-Mobile, led global payments operations and compliance at eBay across 32 countries and multiple currencies, and managed PayPal’s largest global payments partnership with eBay Marketplace.

Ovanti said Criselego’s experience leading payments operations for some of the world’s largest merchants positioned him to ensure Ovanti delivered world-class support and scalable infrastructure for US merchants and PSP partners.

Block executive to join Block  

Former NYSE-listed Block executive Jacek Serafinski has been appointed senior vice president, product & engineering.

Jacek served as senior engineering manager within Afterpay’s merchant engineering division.

He led teams responsible for merchant settlements, reporting, invoicing,and banking infrastructure, overseeing delivery across multiple engineering teams while driving product improvements and process optimization.

Earlier in his career, Jacek was a lead software engineer with Atlassian (via EPAM Systems), where he contributed to major product delivery initiatives and technology transformations.

With more than 15 years of engineering leadership experience across payments and large-scale technology platforms, Jacek is set to lead Ovanti’s product and technology launch in the US, ensuring robust, scalable, agentic systems that will support rapid growth and expansion.

‘Pivotal step’ in Ovanti’s US plans with ‘more to come’ 

Ovanti US BNPL CEO Peter Maher each new appointment brought proven leadership with global payments, merchant and technology companies.

“The addition of Barbara, Daniel and Jacek underscores the calibre of talent joining Ovanti as we roll-out BNPL operations in the US market,” he said.

“This team brings the commercial, operational and engineering depth required to scale quickly in the US market

“This is a pivotal step toward delivering our mission to disrupt the BNPL industry and deliver better outcomes for all stakeholders in the BNPL ecosystem.”

Ovanti chairman and executive director Daler Fayziev said the key executive appointments, with “more to come”, showed large merchants that Ovanti was serious about making the necessary investment in its US business to service major merchants joining the fintech.

“On all fronts Ovanti is making the necessary steps required in order to be in a strong position to disrupt the BNPL industry in the USA market and effectively and forcefully go head-to-head in the USA market against all of our multi-billion dollar competitors,” he said.

This article was developed in collaboration with Ovanti, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.