In our latest edition of Techtalk with TFN, we had the pleasure of sitting down with Maya Kumar, the Executive Vice President of Business Development at Banked, a cutting-edge global payments network. Hosted at the exclusive Marble Arch members’ club for startups, Home Grown, this engaging conversation delved into Kumar’s impressive career trajectory, Banked’s ambitious mission to revolutionize the payments industry, and the evolving role of women in technology.
Watch the full interview, and any of our Techtalks, on our YouTube channel.
Kumar’s pre-fintech background is diverse, including studying politics, entering law, working in finance, and founding a male grooming startup before joining Banked. “I think there’s no perfect path to one’s career progression,” said Kumar. “People have to make career decisions or degree decisions quite young.”
Kumar, therefore, followed a path that interested her, but found, at various points, the options open to her were not what she wanted. It was when she was working in finance that she first dipped her toe in the startup world.
“I went into finance and was living in New York and then in Dublin,” she recalled. But there was something missing, “I wanted more innovation, I wanted to be more cutting edge, I wanted to push boundaries.”
Founding Get Smooth, an on-demand barber service, was arguably an unusual move for a woman in tech, but it set up Kumar for her final move into fintech, where she could combine her entrepreneurial and financial backgrounds.
How Banked is revolutionising global payments landscape
Kumar explained that, as a global payments business, Banked faces challenges as it addresses markets that have matured differently around the world. In the UK, “there’s already a lot more choice versus other markets,” she said. “But that choice doesn’t necessarily drive better economics for the merchant.” She also said there was consumer demand for change. “They want better security, less fraud.”
Already a global player, they have established major partnerships in the UK, Europe, US, and Australia. However, Kumar told us that her goal for 2024 isn’t about growing the network of partners. “We’ve already got the case studies to show we’re very capable of working with very large institutions across multiple markets with very complex onboarding processes,” she told us. “What we need to do is get those partners ready and primed in market to get those purchases active. I would say product deployment is the big thing that we want to see.”
There’s plenty of confidence that Banked is a good investment. Despite Kumar saying they are ‘thoughtful’ about whom they get to invest, they have raised over $50 million from names like Insight Partners and Bank of America.
Embracing diversity and driving innovation in fintech
Fintech is an industry often painted as dominated by white males, but Kumar highlights that diversity is not just about race and gender because people have preconceptions about almost anything. “When you walk into a room, if you look different, not as tall, and all these silly things that people perceive, you’ve got to be confident with the content you create,” Kumar said.
However, she stressed that diversity can be any organisation’s greatest strength. “The more diverse workforce you have, the better it is for everyone.”
Kumar’s advice to anyone is to lean into their diversity, rather than trying to minimise it. “The more you indulge and think about them, the more you’re going to feel retracted.”
Instead, she advises having confidence in the difference you can make. “I say be confident, bring good content, don’t need to prove yourself at every step of the way because it will burn you out,” she said. “Believe that you’re adding value and be a team player as well.”
Kumar sees herself as an example of the benefits of diversity. “I’m not just selling to white men, I’m selling to women of different diversity backgrounds, different countries,” she said. “As a fintech, you need that ability to relate to the different people that you’re interacting with, and then the people that you potentially want to partner with.”
Her main advice, however, is that fintech needs to focus on the mission. “You need to think a bit more laterally about whether you need to go broad in the market or just deep in one end,” she said. For her, fintech should not be added tech for the sake of it — Banked, for example, has not embraced AI — “I think FinTech should be looking at sustainable and profitable growth.”
This article is part of a media partnership with Banked and Homegrown. For partnering opportunities, contact [email protected]m or [email protected].
