Speakers
Jessica Fox
Olympic Champion
There aren't many athletes who can lay claim to being the greatest of all time in their sport by the age of 30. If she weren't so humble, Jess Fox could do just that. The most successful paddler (male or female) in history, Jess has a long list of achievements including 51 World Cup gold medals, 10 World Championship titles, and 3 Olympic gold medals (a total of 6 Olympic medals across four Games). Born in Marseille, France, Jess moved to Australia at age four. With an elite paddling pedigree, her parents, both accomplished paddlers, inspired her passion for the sport. Coached by her mother, Myriam Fox-Jerusalmi, a bronze medallist in K1 at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, Jess quickly rose through the ranks, joining the national junior team in 2009. Her early career was marked by four junior World Championship titles, eight under-23 world titles, and a Youth Olympics gold medal.
Tora Brophy
TikTok, SMB Country Head
Tora Brophy is passionate about growing businesses at scale with digital. Starting his career on the shop floor, Tora has progressed to lead global retail brands in Australia and support the growth of many more at Google and TikTok. Tora’s career journey has taught him to keep the customer at the centre of all decisions, and the value of creating winning team environments where everyone gets better together. Outside of work, Tora likes to spend time with his family and get outdoors. Tora is currently the Country Head of Small Business at TikTok, where he supports businesses of all shapes and sizes to grow using TikTok.
Gretta Svendsen
Salesforce, RVP Small Business
Gretta is a prominent technology executive with extensive experience in both the tech and financial services sectors, focusing on high-growth Software as a Service (SaaS) businesses Currently serving as the Regional Vice President for Digital at Salesforce, Gretta empowers small and medium-sized businesses with advanced data and marketing technology to foster innovation, growth, and efficiency. Previously, Gretta held executive leadership roles at Microsoft, where she led the SMB business for Australia and New Zealand. Her expertise in payments and lending was further honed during her tenure at Xero and CommBank, where she managed financial services business lines, including payments and lending, and spearheaded acquisitions and partnerships to integrate financial services into Xero’s offerings. Throughout her career, Gretta has made a significant impact on the lives of SMBs across the world.
Pete O’Malley
Xero, General Manager, Payments
Pete leads the manage sales and payments team at Xero where he oversees product development for solutions that help small businesses get paid. He is a product leader with over 20 years experience delivering B2B and B2C solutions at companies like Cash App, Afterpay, UBank, PwC and Sage. Pete is passionate about helping small businesses better manage their cash flow after spending his career working in the accounting industry, fintech and payments.
Greg van Rensburg
Zendesk, Vice President, Solutions Consulting, Asia Pacific and Japan
With over two decades of extensive experience in customer software solutions, Greg van Rensburg is a leader dedicated to transforming customer experiences and optimising business processes. As Vice President of Solutions Consulting for Asia Pacific and Japan at Zendesk, Greg heads a team of distinguished experts in customer and employee service solutions. His vast industry expertise spans retail, banking, government, insurance, and utilities, where he has successfully helped drive innovation and efficiency for numerous organisations.
Saket Narayan
AWS, Head of Finance and Regulation Industry for Australia, New Zealand & Oceania
Saket is the Head of Finance and Regulation Industry for Australia, New Zealand & Oceania at Amazon Web Services (AWS). In this capacity, he collaborates with C-suite executives, founders, and senior leaders across financial services regulators, central and commercial banks, tax and revenue authorities, FinTechs, and RegTechs to deliver innovative technology solutions that address complex business challenges. Prior to joining AWS, Saket held significant leadership roles within data, technology, and regulatory business domains at one of Australia's federal financial services regulators for over a decade. Saket possesses extensive experience working with finance industry regulators and the ‘regulated’ across Australia, New Zealand, the United States, the United Kingdom, Singapore, India, and Malaysia. He serves on the Executive Committee for the RegTech Global Association as an Industry Advisor and is a Strategic Innovation Advisor on the FinTechNZ working committee.
Jordan Sim
BigCommerce, VP of Product
Jordan is the VP of Product at BigCommerce. He is responsible for shaping the global strategy for core elements of BigCommerce's ecommerce platform. Prior to BigCommerce, Jordan worked at Deloitte Digital, where he directly consulted with ASX Top 100 companies as a Digital Strategist and Interaction Designer.
Nick Gray
Founder and CEO, I got you
Nick Gray is rapidly emerging as one of today's leading voices in the retail industry. His thought leadership and insights have shaped the strategies of globally recognised retailers, brands, and wholesalers, leaving a lasting impact on the industry. With over 25 years of experience in the wholesale and retail sectors, Nick's journey includes pivotal roles at world-renowned companies like Adidas, Nike, Sneakerboy, Diesel, and Westfield. His work is deeply rooted in the belief that people, emotions, and customers should be at the core of every business decision. Nick's expertise has made him a sought-after speaker and thought leader, featured in numerous speaking engagements, podcasts, and webinars. Recognised by Rethink Retail as a Top Retail Expert and Influencer, his distinctive perspectives on retail, branding, business, and consumer behaviour are frequently highlighted in leading publications such as Inside Retail, among others.
Carl Florance
DaddyRich Records, Owner
Carl Florance is the proud founder and owner of DaddyRich Records. Having overcome mental health, substance abuse, and other challenges throughout much of his life, Carl committed to recovery and rediscovered his passion for vinyl records. With the help of PayPal Working Capital, Carl managed to transform an online side hustle powered by public transport, into a thriving cultural cornerstone of his community and the business of his dreams, with ambitious plans for further growth.
Nadia Syed
SVP, International Cross Border Trade and GM, APAC, PayPal
Nadia is responsible for delivering PayPal’s commercial growth in some of the world’s fastest growing digital economies, growing a leading two-sided network with a focus on developing a strong merchant and consumer franchise across APAC markets. With a decade of experience at PayPal, Nadia’s prior role as Vice President of Product, Asia, MEA, LATAM saw her driving business and product strategy for PayPal’s International markets, as well as delivering new value propositions for merchants and consumers.
Nitin Prabhu
SVP, SMB and FS Product, PayPal
Nitin Prabhu serves as the Senior Vice President of SMB and Financial Services Products at PayPal. Joining the company in 2012, Prabhu has worked in many different roles spanning the payments, merchant and consumer businesses. His current remit includes PayPal’s full suite of products that serve SMBs. This ranges from payments to value added services (VAS) – PayPal’s financial service products like Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL), credit and debit cards – as well as PayPal’s in-store product suite. Prior to joining PayPal, Prabhu gained valuable experience in the consulting world, serving leading global financial services brands. Outside of his professional life, he enjoys reading, traveling, gardening, badminton, working with startups and spending time with family.
Russ Eisenman
VP of B2B Marketing, PayPal
As Vice President of B2B Marketing at PayPal, Russ Eisenman is responsible for shaping and executing strategic marketing initiatives that drive growth for businesses around the world. With a deep expertise in digital transformation and B2B marketing, Russ focuses on creating pathways to growth while enhancing operational efficiency for business owners. Previously, Russ served as Global Growth Marketing Lead at Square, where he empowered millions of merchants to grow their businesses. His experience extends to Airbnb, where he developed tools to help hosts manage and grow their businesses, and Uber Freight, where he streamlined solutions for small carriers. Earlier in his career, as a consumer marketing leader, Russ played a pivotal role at JPMorgan Chase, overseeing the launch of the Chase Mobile app and Quick Deposit, products that transformed consumer banking. Grounded in a merchant-first philosophy, Russ’s leadership prioritizes delivering solutions that meet the evolving needs of business owners, driving long-term growth and success.
Simon Banks
Managing Director, PayPal Australia
Simon is responsible for the strategies, execution and leadership of the teams that drive digital commerce success for Australian companies when partnering with PayPal. Simon is also Managing Director of Hyperwallet, a separately licensed PayPal business, offering a platform to enable cross border payout orchestration. Simon has more than 20 years’ experience in disruptive digital technologies, digital commerce, payments, cloud computing and enterprise software. This includes senior management roles across Salesforce.com, Siebel, Oracle, and others prior to joining PayPal. A customer-focused leader, he is passionate about the role that technology and payments play in enabling businesses to evolve and innovate around customer needs. Simon is also Chair of Hyperwallet Australia (a PayPal company) and a non-executive director of PayPal Giving Fund Australia and an active investor and advisor to small tech disruptors.
Andrew Toon
General Manager, PayPal Australia
Andrew Toon is a passionate advocate for the leveraging of new technology and innovation to create better experiences for consumer and merchant customers. A seasoned Senior Executive with a global career in Payments, Andrew joined PayPal in 2019 after leading Financial Services Strategy and Partnerships for Qantas. Before this Andrew held various senior positions within Visa, both in Australia and Hong Kong, and other market-leading financial institutions including AMP and MasterCard. At PayPal Australia, Andrew has overseen an unprecedented period of revenue growth and capability development, including the launch of Australia’s first no interest, no late fee buy now, pay later service - PayPal Pay in 4; and many other enhancements to products that provide avenues for Australians to use PayPal to pay online safely, with greater flexibility and conveniently. Andrew has also driven unprecedented improvements to the operating model that PayPal utilises to optimise its business via EFTPOS, the NPP and International Network enhancements, along with proprietary platforms.
Alison O’Brien
Director of Customer Success, PayPal
Alison joined PayPal Australia in 2015 after eight years helping transform a disruptive payments start-up with a handful of employees, to a powerhouse enabling more than $8 billion in transactions per year. Having performed almost every role supporting this explosive growth, Alison has applied her diverse skills and experience to several roles at PayPal, including Business Development Manager, Channel Partnerships, Head of Marketplaces, and Head of Merchant Services. Alison now leads a multinational team responsible for optimising business customer engagement and outcomes, as Director of Customer Success.
Gavin Healy
Head of Solutions and Integrations Engineering, PayPal Australia
Gavin is the Head of Solutions Engineering for PayPal in Australia, leading the Enterprise Integrations team. With extensive expertise in complex enterprise solutions and a focus on driving innovation in payments technology, he plays a key role in enabling seamless merchant integrations and promoting PayPal’s latest advancements in the Australian market.
Bonnie Brady
Partnerships Manager, PayPal Australia
Bonnie Brady is a dynamic professional with expertise in payments, eCommerce, and partnerships. Her current role at PayPal Australia sees her manage strategic relationships and channel platform integrations, enabling seamless merchant payment offerings at scale. With a background in leading partnerships and sales at Payoneer, a global cross-border payments platform, Bonnie brings a wealth of experience to her role. Her passion for commerce was cultivated during her time at Trade Me, New Zealand's largest online marketplace.
