ORGANISED BY

The New World Payments Takes Shape

11 September 2025
The Ritz-Carlton JBR Dubai, United Arab Emirates


  • img-responsive 400+ Regional Banking, Finance, Fintech and Technology Leaders, Standardisation Organisations, Regulators, Financial Trade Associations
  • img-responsive 30+ Thought Leaders, Innovators and Market Makers & Experts
  • img-responsive 6 In-depth and lively sessions on the future and state of Payments in the region
  • img-responsive 1 Full day of Peer Interaction and Networking
  • img-responsive 1 Awards Winners Presentation
    Ceremony

Overview

Payments development and activity across our region has remained enthusiatically energetic in and is set to remain so for some time to come. Technology and AI, regulators and governments, multilateral cooperation, standardisation and competition, fintechs and non-financial institutions, global circumstances and consumer demand all, individually and collectively keep pushing the rate at which payments are changing and improving.

Payments are becoming more than only agile, intuitive and convenient, but also, as these features become more embedded, they can now have real positive influences for economies and societies as efficiencies aid productivity and foster greater inclusion.

As more generations of clients and diverse consumer groups become increasingly familiar with new payment choices, the beneficial conveniences and more flexible options that now exist promise to bring a period of growth and inclusion that will drive regional economies.

Our region remains largely resilient to the numerous challenges currently facing the world, with many economies coping better with the stresses of quickly shifting circumstances that many of their international counterparts are slowed by. This has relaxed the brakes on the wheels speeding slong the payments rails and helped the region take a lead in the development of real-time payments.

Likewise, the region’s banking and finance sectors maintain consistently positive performance, helping to boost them purposefully toward their strategic goals.

Once again, the Leaders in Payments Conference and Awards 2025, will gather regional leaders in Banking and Finance, Technology and Fintechs, Regulators and Multilateral Organisations in a series of lively and highly topical panel debates. The Summit discussions will focus upon the current evolution of payments in the region, the changes technology can bring, their benefits to societies, the challenges to be faced, the trends that are leading them and the shape of the tasks ahead needed to maintain effective, efficient and progressive payments systems.

What to expect?

  • More than 400 regional banking, payments and technology leaders with a format attracting the entire spectrum of interested professionals including regulators, technology companies, startups, fintechs, central banks, innovators and other stakeholders from the value chains.
  • Solid engagement opportunities for your company with decision makers, to directly detail your company’s solutions to today’s most pressing payments related issues.
  • Exposure to the regional banking communities with your brand visibility in the networking and exhibition area during breaks and through participation in panel discussions and keynote presentations.
  • Opportunities to be recognised and celebrated as a bank or technology business at the forefront of payments transformation and progress at the MEA Finance Payments Awards

Who should attend?

  • Chief Executive Officer
  • Chief Financial Officer
  • Chief Technology Officer
  • Chief Information Officer
  • Chief Operating Officer
  • Chairman
  • Chief Audit Executive
  • Chief Commercial Officer
  • Chief Economist and Head of Research
  • Chief of Shared Services Officer
  • Chief Risk Officer
  • Managing Director
  • MD - Head of Treasury, Capital Markets & FI Department & Section Heads
  • Partner - Financial Services
  • Advisor - Investment Management
  • Commercial Advisor
  • Executive Director
  • Head of Client Relations
  • Head of Payments, Remittances & Foreign Exchange
  • Head of Regulatory Advisory and Assurance
  • Head of Transaction Banking
  • Head Corporate Relations and Strategic Partnerships
  • Head Digital Strategy and Change
  • Head of Corporate Communications
  • Head Digital Strategy and Change
  • Head of E-Banking
  • Head of Market Risk
  • Head of AML & Sanctions
  • Head of Bancassurance
  • Head of CAD, Remedial & Collection
  • Head of Central Operations
  • Head of Change Management
  • Head of Client Experience
  • Head of Compliance
  • Head of CRM
  • Head of Disclosure and Issuance Department
  • Head of Enterprise Architecture
  • Head of Enterprise Banking Platforms
  • Head of External Communications
  • Head of Finance
  • Head of Financial Institutions
  • Head of Government Relations & PR
  • Head of Information Security
  • Head of Investment Solutions
  • Head of Issuance
  • Head of Prepaid Cards
  • Head of Regulatory Compliance
  • Head of Retail Banking
  • Head of Risk Specialist
  • Head of Strategic Planning
  • Head of Strategy - Technology
  • Head of Transaction Banking
  • Head Product Manager
  • Manager Audit & Compliance
  • Manager Operational Risk
  • Payments & Contract Manager
  • Portfolio Specialist - Insights & Strategy
  • Project Manager
  • Regional Compliance Manager
  • Regional Manager - Compliance & Risk Retention & Vigilance Manager
  • Senior CRM Project Lead
  • Senior CX Manager
  • Senior Manager - Digital Transformation
  • Senior Manager Treasury
  • Information Security, Senior Strategic Advisor
  • Senior Trade Officer, Strategy & PMO
  • Assistant Vice President - Global Customer Relations
  • Associate VP - Strategic Engagements
  • AVP Agile Delivery - Retail Banking
  • AVP Credit Risk and Portfolio Manager
  • FS Strategy Manager
  • SVP & Head of Compliance - Personal Banking Group
  • SVP & Regional Head - Corporate & Commercial Banking
  • Vice President, Compliance
  • VP Risk and Change Management
  • VP Wealth and Asset Management
  • VP - Strategic Initiatives & Bancassurance

MEA Finance Conference

The MEA Finance Conferences are known for bringing together over 500 regional banking, investment and technology leaders for a day of immersive discussion on the latest developments and most pressing issues being faced across the sectors of the banking industry across our region.

These one-day, exclusive gathering provide intense and fruitful networking opportunities and include audience presentations and panel discussions, with an array of the region's industry-leading experts, innovators and distinguished speakers who meet to discuss the future of banking and innovation in finance.

Provisional Agenda

The Ritz-Carlton JBR Dubai, Thursday, 11 September 2025

Challenging Times
Thanks to technology and collective will, payments are more fluid, quicker, smarter and diverse, providing greater convenience, fast settlement, wider access and inclusivity. This is largely considered a good thing. But it also means that the challenges faced by the payments sector have also become more diverse. Whether challenges be from mandated deadlines, fraud prevention, financial crime, marketplace competition and the accompanying requirements of regulators or their ability to keep pace with developments, how will the challenges of modern payments be satisfactorily met?
Teamwork Tested
Payment Gateways and APls-different technologies working together to bring satisfactory payments results. How will payment gateways and APls to develop? As Al plays a greater role, consumers expect more seamless omnichannel payments and hyper-personalised experiences, biometric authentication increases as security enhancement is demanded, crypto currencies become integrated and regulatory compliance gains emphasis, how will the relationship between payment gateways and APls develop? What effect will these developments have on the already intense competition in the worlds of payment gateways and APls?
Dealing with Deadlines
ISO 20022 comes of age this November when it not only reaches its implementation deadline, but also its 21st year since launch in 2004. In 2020, and with its own 2027 deadline, the G20's Roadmap for Enhancing Cross-Border Payments was mandated, aimed at growing economies and living standards via cheaper, faster, more inclusive and transparent cross border payments. Will they meet their stated aims and ideals? When envisaged, was today's technology and Al factored in, and does it really make any difference when it comes to meeting deadlines when so much of what creates delay is people? Can and will these deadlines be met?
Cross Border Payments & Remittances
Away from supranational mandates and deadlines, what more can be done to enhance cross border payments, be them small scale remittances or large corporate payments? How is the vitally important remittances business in the region developing? Technology and Al has a key part in this but can it evolve to accommodate frequently shifting human instigated circumstances? Cross border transactions could account for almost one -third of global ecommerce spending by the late 2020's so will the need for standardisation or unification of APls increase? Is there a need or space for more multinational payments systems such as Buna and Afaq across the region and Africa?
Technology and AI
Future in the Present- Technology and Al are effectively the anatomy of payments - bringing new services, agility, convenience and reducing human error, impeding financial crime, providing data derived efficiencies and accurate digital transactions. What roles can we expect Agentic Al to play across the payments spectrum? As an example, can Payments as a Service allow banks to more easily and economically modernise their legacy systems? What vulnerabilities might reliance on technology bring and what more can they bring to the payments world that we do not already have?
Real Time Leaders
Our region is the quickest developing real-time digital payments markets in the world. Why? What are the factors lying behind this achievement - willing and enterprising technology businesses and financial institutions, a tech-native demographic based demand-side, government initiatives, the wide use of smartphones or the prevalence of e-commerce? What are the possible outcomes for the region of this leadership in adaptation? As a consequence, could our region's leading position come to shape the global payments landscape?

2024 Speakers




MORE SPEAKERS TO BE ANNOUNCED



Highlights

The New World Payments Takes Shape

The MEA Finance Leaders in Payments Awards 2025 will celebrate and recognise the outstanding achievements of banks, financial institutions, payment providers, and technology suppliers who are driving innovation and excellence across the payments landscape in the Middle East and Africa.

These prestigious awards will highlight the exceptional contributions made toward building efficient, secure, and future-ready payments systems—systems that are rapidly becoming benchmarks on the global stage. Through this recognition, MEA Finance honours the dedication and leadership that continue to shape the region’s dynamic payments ecosystem.
NOMINATE NOW REGISTER NOW
  • Open for Nominations: 26 May 2025
  • Submission Deadline: 07 August 2025
  • Judging Process: 11 August 2025
  • Awards Ceremony: 11 September 2025

Categories

Click below to view individual award categories and submit nominations.

Awarded to the Payment Gateway business, clearly providing the best service across factors including payment options, reliability, security, market integration, pricing and currency support.
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Awarded to the bank or financial institution that has put in place and/or operates a payment gateway providing secure service, verification and confirmation, plus options for flexible purchasing experiences for customers.
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Awarded to the business providing the most comprehensive opportunity for online companies to manage their payment processes in one place, from beginning to end.
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Nominees for this award will be companies in the region that have shown the most innovation in making quick clearance and settlement of payments a reality, using underlying payments rails.
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Winning this award will be a bank or financial institution in the region that has shown market leading initiative in commissioning and implementing quick clearance and settlement of payments using new or underlying payments rails.
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Awarded to the provider of ancillary services for a real-time payments method that definitively shows the best provision of options beyond core payment processing and adding value to standard payments.
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Nominations for this award will be from business that, in addition to providing leading edge technology in payments has through their implementation also helped to advance their local payments environment.
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Nominations for this award will be from business that, in addition to providing leading edge technology in payments has through their implementation also helped to advance their local payments environment.
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The award will be presented to the financial institution, fintech or technology company that can show it has brought the best ease of process and delight to users of their payments systems or methods.
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The award will be presented to the financial institution, fintech or technology company that can show it has brought the best ease of process and delight to users of their payments systems or methods.
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Awarded to the technology provider that can demonstrate the best solutions and services for the provision of cross-border payments in the region.
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This award will go to the business or organisation that has been judged to have made the most significant contribution to the regional cross-border payments landscape in the recent past.
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Nominees in this category will demonstrate the best cloud-located services across the payment value chain including cost optimisation, improved scalability, high security, faster functionality roll-out and flexible pricing.
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The threat of cyber-crime remains a key concern across all payments related systems and stakeholders. The winner of this award will have shown innovative and proven measures and approaches toward safeguarding payments in today’s fast-evolving digital landscape
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The winner of this award will be users or providers of payments solutions that brought easier access for third party providers or enabled financial institutions to comply with the regulations and increase their services.
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This will be won by the technology company, fintech or financial institution that is or has been actively engaged in a digital payments transformation initiative. Consideration will be given to transformative outcomes from either from the operations perspective, the societal perspective or a combination both.
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This will be awarded to the company that has developed and launched a mobile application that successfully offers a wide and flexible range of convenient, innovative and secure user payments options.
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This is awarded to the company or financial institution that best demonstrates both the specific intention and results in bringing all communities the opportunities to transact and create improved life options.
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Awarded to the bank or financial institution that commissioned and completed an instant payments technology implementation that enhanced the services offered to their clients and contributed to their wider banking technology development objectives and profitability.
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This will be awarded to the financial institution or bank that has implemented an innovative payments solution bringing new customer opportunities to use with marked improvements or upgrades to legacy or existing systems.
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Awarded to the business that provided a payments technology implementation that enhanced the services offered to their clients’ markets but also, through the overall commission of their activities, contributed to the wider national payments and banking technology development objectives.
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This award goes to the Financial Institution and/or Technology Vendor for the most effective, efficient, innovative and successful implementation of a corporate banking collections systems . Nominations are welcome from Banks and Technology Businesses for their own part in a project, or jointly as a Bank and Technology firm who have successfully collaborated on such implementation.
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This award goes remittance payments and over the counter foreign exchange services company providing the best access via a broad branch network, digital services, speed of service and readily available range of currencies, meeting the needs of the communities depending on these services.
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Awarded to the company that or financial institution that has stood out for the implementation of a payments system. Key considerations, assessed both individually and collectively will include security, flexibility, transaction speed, ease of operation or use and wider levels of inclusivity
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In the highly populated and diverse payments services space in the region, this award will go to the company or institution judged as having made the most successful and beneficial contribution to this sector.
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This award will go to the Bank that has been judged as having made the most successful and beneficial contribution to this important and highly competitive sector.
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Nominations are welcome from companies, financial institutions, organisations, associations or individuals that, over the past year to eighteen months, can demonstratively define an innovation of note in the regional payments market.
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Nominations are welcome from companies, financial institutions, organisations, associations or individuals that, over the past year to eighteen months, can demonstratively define an innovation of note in the regional payments market.
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This award will be presented to the company that in the past twelve to eighteen months has shown the most original and dedicated focus in supplying technology that has offered the most potential or definitively improved the payments experience for the market.
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This award is presented to the individual that through their efforts has been assessed to have made the most noticeable contribution to the technological advancement of the regional payments sector.
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This award is presented to the individual working in non-bank financial services who through their efforts has been assessed to have made the most noticeable contribution to the technological advancement of the regional payments sector.
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This award will be presented to the executive in a leading position that has worked through their career to guide and lead businesses through the ever-evolving digital payments landscape, keeping them at the forefront of their respective markets.
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The winner in this category will have demonstrated, through the application of Artificial Intelligence, both innovation and imagination leading to visible enhancements and improvements to payments systems or processes.
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This award is presented to the individual that through their efforts has been assessed to have made the most noticeable contribution to the advancement of service and management in the regional payments sector.
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Submission Process

MEA Finance conducts its own research to ensure that our awards categories accurately reflect the current payments ecosystem and comprehensively recognise the achievements of the industry.

As a result, we have determined 24 award categories that provide regional recognition to exceptional banks, financial institutions and technology providers who are shaping the new digital financial landscape and have made outstanding contributions to the future of the industry. Institutions can nominate themselves in all relevant categories as deemed appropriate, provided the submission is sent in before the deadline, and in the required format.
NOMINATE NOW

 

HOW TO ENTER

STEP 1: Choose your category.
It is important to review the individual descriptions and criteria before choosing your category.
STEP 2: Upload relevant financial performance documents or other relevant information.
STEP 3: Confirm submission of your entry.

*Submissions deadline 28thAugust 2025.

Judging Process

The awards will feature a rigorous two-step judging process by a panel of industry experts in collaboration with the MEA Finance editorial team.

  1. All nomination entries will be meticulously evaluated and analysed based on relevant market knowledge, industry research, and accurate company financial statements. The MEA Finance editorial team will then create a shortlist which will be given to the judging panel.
  2. The judging panel will be composed of senior executives from professional services firms working with the banking industry. They will review the shortlist and the submitted materials for each category and place a score from 1 to 5 for each category nominee. All scores will be sent back to the editorial team.
  3. The MEA Finance editorial team will independently score shortlisted institutions per category. Score values will be from 1 to 5. All scores will be kept confidential and will not be released publicly, nor will they be discussed with any individual applicants.
  4. Scores from both the judging panel and the editorial team shall be collected and combined. The editorial team will hold an official tabulation of the scores to determine the highest scoring institution per category which will be declared winner

Sponsors


 

  • LEAD SPONSOR

SILVER SPONSOR

FOR SPEAKING, SPONSORSHIP & EXHIBITION ENQUIRIES:

Nap Estampador
+971 50 100 5488
nap.estampador@mea-finance.com

Andrew Cover
+971 50 931 3236
andrew.cover@mea-finance.com

Kenneth Mitchen
+971 55 289 1739
ken.mitchen@mea-finance.com

FOR SPEAKING & AGENDA ENQUIRIES:

Natasha Cristi
+971 58 527 1219
natasha@mea-finance.com

Venue

The Ritz-Carlton JBR, Dubai, United Arab Emirates

MEA Finance Leaders in Payments Conference & Awards 2025
11 September 2025
The Ritz Carlton JBR,
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
CONTACT US
Contact No. +971 50 100 5488
Al Saaha Offices, Old Town Island
Burj Khalifa District,
PO Box 487177
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
www.mea-finance.com