Fintech Galaxy brings global Open Finance experience to the MENA region

Fintech Galaxy, a financial innovation firm, has announced the addition of a team of global Open Banking/Finance experts as it seeks to expand its product offering and presence throughout the MENA region.

Dmitrii Barbasura, former CEO and co-founder of Salt Edge, has been appointed as Chief Operating Officer, along with Chief Financial Officer Iaroslav Babenco, Sales Director Cristian Gheorghita, and a technical team comprised of Pavel Kipkala, Ana Maria Bahnarel, and Natalia Muhianov with experience in Open Banking/Finance compliance and data aggregation. Diana Hriplivaia and Adriana Arnaut provide legal and public relations and content support, respectively. The team has over 25 years of combined experience in the banking and finance sectors.

The Open Finance experts have joined Fintech Galaxy to help it achieve its mission of increasing financial inclusion and bringing open banking and finance to the MENA region through its fast, secure, and developer-friendly proprietary platform www.thefinx.io. Open Finance is the next step in the evolution of Open Banking. It extends the Open Banking benefits to a broader range of financial products and provides greater visibility and control over the financial state.

Mirna Sleiman, CEO & founder of Fintech Galaxy, commented: “Our vision is to bring financial inclusion to the 2 billion population around us. This can’t be possible without Open Banking and Embedded Finance. We are delighted to strengthen our team with a raft of experienced professionals, who bring global expertise to our region and elevate our product offering to serve next customers.”

These appointments come as Fintech Galaxy, which was founded in the UAE in 2018, works to build its platform FINX through open innovation in order to provide Open Banking and Open Finance infrastructure. FINX Connect offers account aggregation and payment initiation capabilities, as well as a unique API sandbox, while FINX Comply assists banks and financial institutions in becoming compliant with local Open Banking/Finance regulations with minimal effort.

Sleiman added: “It is no secret that Open Finance has triggered a major transformation in the global banking industry. Our own innovation platform and API sandbox have powered more than 30 use cases with leading institutions over the past two years, which resulted in FinTechs successfully designing apps and delivering proof of concepts (PoCs). Providing Open Finance infrastructure and production capabilities as a technical service provider (TSP) is only a natural development of our product strategy and regional presence.”

Fintech Galaxy is currently discussing innovative Account Information and Payment Initiation Services use cases with a number of financial institutions in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) to serve both retail and corporate customers.