RZ
◆ Recruiter brief

Product & Program Executive for Payments Infrastructure

A 5-minute view of Rizwan Zafar's fit for senior product, program and fintech infrastructure roles: regulated payment rails, complex markets, bank and wallet partnerships, risk/compliance and execution at scale.

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Certified: PMP · PMI-ACP · CSPO · CSM · COBIT 5 · ITIL
$1B+
GTV scaled
270M+
Annual transactions
5
Live platform markets
99.95%
Settlement SLA
40
Engineers led
3 + 1
Production systems + pilot
Region coverage

MARKETS

Regions connected to payments operations, market expansion, rails and corridor work.

UAEKSAPakistanBangladeshSri LankaNepalMyanmarIraqEgyptMENASouth Asia

Verification Posture

Big claims need diligence. This is the recruiter-safe way to read the proof.

Entity anchors

Public identity anchors are aligned in schema: LinkedIn, Wikidata, Crunchbase and GitHub.

Third-party checks

Current role, public company context and entity identity are externally discoverable.

Reference posture

Partner, bank and enterprise-platform references can be provided for senior hiring diligence.

NDA-safe metrics

Commercial metrics are framed as platform-scale outcomes; confidential details remain reference-verifiable.

Where The Fit Is Strongest

Roles where product strategy, regulated execution and payment infrastructure meet.

Product Leadership

VP Product, Head of Product, Director Product, Product Lead for payments or fintech infrastructure.

  • Scaled multi-rail pay-in, payout, wallet, DCB, IBFT, card acquiring and cross-border products.
  • Owned product strategy, roadmap, partner coverage, authorization, activation and platform economics.
  • Built infrastructure used by enterprise platforms including TikTok, Samsung, Shein, Uber and MoneyGram.

Program / PMO Leadership

Program Director, Head of PMO, Technical Program Manager or transformation leader.

  • Led a 40-engineer payments organisation across 12 cross-functional squads; managed a $5M+ technology budget and 15+ vendor relationships.
  • Built governance across product, engineering, risk, compliance, operations and executive reporting.
  • Delivered PCI DSS and ISO/IEC 27001 certification programs from scratch.

Payments Infrastructure

Payment infrastructure, payment orchestration, cross-border corridors, settlement and reconciliation.

  • Built regulated rails across local methods, cards, wallets, payout flows, FX and partner routing.
  • Held 97% payment success at 90% straight-through processing and a 99.95% settlement SLA.
  • Worked where compliance, risk, bank partnerships and market operations are part of the product.

AI In Fintech Operations

AI-enabled product operations, support automation, fraud/AML decisioning and incident response.

  • Shipped 3 production AI/GenAI systems inside payment operations, plus 1 banking pilot.
  • Reduced merchant support time, incident response time and partner support load with practical AI systems.
  • Can separate production value from AI theater, especially in regulated environments.

Hiring Lenses

Same track record, three recruiter views. Use the lens closest to the search mandate.

Visa / MastercardStripe / Adyen / Wise / ThunesBanks / Regulated fintechs
Visa / Mastercard

For Visa & Mastercard

Network-rails work, acceptance, tokenization, scheme settlement, cross-border product and emerging-market expansion.

VisaMastercardVisa DirectMastercard Move
Target roles
  • Director / Senior Director, Acceptance Product
  • Head of Cross-Border Product
  • Tokenization, settlement or scheme-readiness product lead
  • Emerging-market payment infrastructure lead
Proof signals
Acceptance & acquiring
MPGS · MDES · 3DS
Scale
$1B+ GTV
Controls
<0.1% fraud loss
Markets
MENA · South Asia
Best case studies
Simpaisa Payment Infrastructure PlatformPayment Infrastructure→Settlement + Reconciliation Engine: 99.95% Accuracy at $1B+ GTVSettlement & Reconciliation→Cross-Border Corridors + FX InfrastructureCross-Border Payments→
Stripe / Adyen / Wise / Thunes

For Stripe, Adyen, Wise & Thunes

Orchestration, local methods, cross-border corridors, payouts and the developer-facing platform.

StripeAdyenWiseThunesDLocalCheckout.comRapyd
Target roles
  • Product Lead, Payment Orchestration
  • Head of Local Payment Methods
  • Director, Payouts / Cross-Border
  • Product Manager, Developer Experience for payments
Proof signals
Rails
Cards · wallets · DCB · IBFT
Partner stack
DLocal · Thunes · Boku · Coda
Transactions
270M+ / year
Developer surface
APIs · webhooks · routing
Best case studies
Simpaisa Payment Infrastructure PlatformPayment Infrastructure→Settlement + Reconciliation Engine: 99.95% Accuracy at $1B+ GTVSettlement & Reconciliation→Cross-Border Corridors + FX InfrastructureCross-Border Payments→
Banks / Regulated fintechs

For Banks & Regulated Fintechs

SWIFT, ISO 20022, AML/CFT, sanctions, PCI DSS, ISO 27001 and the operating model regulators expect.

Sponsor banksRegulated PSPsCentral-bank licensed fintechs
Target roles
  • Head of Payments Product
  • Director, Compliance / Risk Product
  • Program Director, SWIFT / ISO 20022 / payments modernization
  • Head of Regulated Merchant Onboarding
Proof signals
Compliance programs
PCI DSS · ISO 27001
Risk domain
AML/CFT · sanctions · fraud
Governance
PMO · SteerCo · audit trail
Data standards
SWIFT · ISO 20022
Best case studies
SWIFT MT/MX Implementation: ISO 20022 Migration + gpi at SimpaisaCross-Border Payments→Simpaisa Payment Infrastructure PlatformPayment Infrastructure→Settlement + Reconciliation Engine: 99.95% Accuracy at $1B+ GTVSettlement & Reconciliation→

Shortlist for serious payments, product and program mandates.

Best fit: fintech infrastructure, payment networks, PSPs, banks, OTT/ecommerce platforms and transformation programs where product strategy and delivery discipline must work together.

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