Welcome to our coffee Q&A series, where we sit down with Advapay team members for a conversation and insights from the field of digital banking. If you’re joining us for the first time, we spoke with our Product Owner Evgenii Zelenskyi and our COO Natalia Suurtee-Pavlova for our last interviews. Today, we’re with Hamid Najafi, Head of Partnerships at Advapay, to discuss industry trends, Advapay partnerships and the future of fintech.
HOST: Great to have you – thanks for taking time out of your day to chat so our readers can get to know you and what you do. Since this is a coffee break series, we always love asking interviewees what kind of coffee they’re drinking. What’s in your cup?
HAMID: Hi there! I’m Hamid and I’m the Head of Partnerships over here at Advapay.
Now, to answer your question, I’m actually more of a tea drinker. I’m Persian and being that I’m from a tea-loving country, tea is a big part of my culture. Green tea’s my personal favourite.
HOST: Tea’s wonderful too – lots of antioxidants, right? Moving on to the next question…could you tell us more about yourself? I’d love to hear about your professional journey and what you do outside of work. What are your interests and passions?
HAMID: Sure. First and foremost, I’m a team player: I’m a former soccer/football player. In terms of my career, I’ve spent the majority of my work in fintech—my passion is driving fintech innovation globally. The opportunity to make a positive impact in the world of payments inspires and motivates me everyday: a big reason why I’m at Advapay.
HOST: Could you walk us through your experiences and how they shaped your career path on your way to Advapay?
HAMID: Yes. Really, all my experiences ultimately converged and brought me here. I’ve worked at a Swiss bank, software houses, and with alternative payment methods and merchant acquisition. I’ve also spent a few years working with crypto products. These all gave me insight and first-hand knowledge I use working at Advapay.
HOST: How do you approach building these long-term, mutually beneficial partnerships?
HAMID: First, we identify fintech and digital banking partners that need our solutions and have customers or clients that align with Advapay. We typically partner with organizations who have clients looking for a core banking system provider or connection to a digital core banking platform. We also advise on the technical side of setting up fintech businesses on behalf of our partners.
If the majority of their audience, whether they’re a technology company, entrepreneur or advisory firm, could use digital banking solutions, that’s the key – that means we could work together long-term.
HOST: What are the key challenges in partnership development, and how do you navigate them?
HAMID: Sometimes partnerships become very passive because the communications slow down. But ongoing, regular meetings keep a partnership in active mode and keep it alive. Otherwise, it’s just really easy for partnerships to fall out of sync and get out of alignment.
HOST: How do you measure the success of a partnership?
HAMID: A successful partnership should offer financial benefit to both sides and should bring complex solutions to market successfully without any major issues. Managing complexity and developing a solution that’s a clear winner in the marketplace is a great feeling for all involved.
HOST: That makes sense. Our next question is: how you work with correspondent banks and payment systems to open accounts for your clients? Could you walk us through how this works in practice.
HAMID: Great question. First off, this is a particularly complex and critical aspect of my role. I work closely with payment institutions regulated in the UK, EU, Middle East, and Asia to understand their risk appetite, compliance requirements, and onboarding processes. Most of our clients require that the payment provider is capable of issuing named Virtual IBANs in multiple currencies. To address this, I have developed a comprehensive database of payment institutions, detailing their geographic coverage and supported currencies. Based on the client’s profile and needs, we facilitate introductions to the most suitable providers.
Typically, working with banks is more challenging due to stricter compliance standards and longer onboarding timelines. I often attend fintech and banking events to engage with bank representatives in person, as I believe this is the most effective way to build trust and establish strong relationships. During these meetings, I gather detailed information on the bank’s onboarding criteria and coverage. Once we’re aligned, we can then introduce clients whose profiles match the bank’s parameters. We have to manage expectations accordingly and provide the right client support because banks typically require more extensive documentation and due diligence compared to Electronic Money Institutions (EMIs). That’s another piece of this.
HOST: Ok, so that’s how you work with your banking and payment partnerships, but let’s talk about consultant and lawyer relationships. How you work with local consultants and lawyers so that they recommend your company to their clients?
HAMID: We collaborate closely with local consultants, including fintech lawyers, to support their clients with regulatory-compliant core banking software. Additionally, we assist in preparing IT documentation that meets regulatory requirements. Beyond technology, we also provide fintech advisory services and licensing support, helping clients obtain licenses or registrations outside their home jurisdictions—for example, in Canada—MSB registration. This comprehensive approach ensures that consultants and lawyers can confidently recommend us as a trusted partner for their clients’ regulatory and operational needs.
HOST: Can you share an example of a particularly successful partnership you’ve built?
HAMID: Partnering with software houses is particularly rewarding to me. With these partnerships, they become our local representatives and use our core banking to develop payment products for their clients. They can also help our customers with custom development, so they get a banking solution that fits their unique requirements.
HOST: What are the biggest trends shaping the fintech and payments industry right now?
HAMID: There’s a few notable trends I’d like to mention here: open banking and data sharing, real-time payments and crypto adoption, embedded finance and BaaS. The industry is rapidly changing and that’s a huge opportunity.
Staying ahead of the curve and up-to-date on these trends is a big part of what we do at Advapay, so I have to be in the know and follow change constantly.
HOST: How do you see partnerships evolving in the digital banking ecosystem?
HAMID: Partnerships in digital banking are becoming more integrated and ecosystem-driven, with banks, fintechs, and tech firms collaborating through APIs, open banking, and embedded finance to enhance customer experiences, drive innovation, and scale faster
HOST: How do regulations impact partnerships in the financial sector?
HAMID: Regulations play a crucial role in shaping partnerships in the financial sector. For example, with the recent regulatory changes in Canada, we are working closely with our clients and partners—such as other payment systems where our clients hold accounts—to ensure a smooth adaptation. Since fintechs operate within an interconnected ecosystem rather than in isolation, regulatory updates often require collaboration between both clients and partners to stay compliant and maintain seamless operations.
HOST: What industries or markets do you see as untapped opportunities for partnerships?
HAMID: I can think of several right away. These are untapped frontiers that really offer a lot of promise: embedded finance in retail and e-commerce, fintech solutions for SMEs and the gig economy, and cross-border payments in emerging markets.
HOST: How does Advapay differentiate itself in building partnerships?
HAMID: We look for partnerships that can offer more complex solutions to the market, it can help up us to have a better position and long-term partnership.
HOST: What are some key partnership goals for Advapay this year?
HAMID: We want to expand our software house partnership networks, so we are open to have local fintech advisory, software integrators and fintech transformation firms as our new partners. We also plan to do integrations with many new providers that can add new features to our software.
HOST: What’s the best way for different teams (sales, operations, support) to collaborate with the partnerships team?
HAMID: I see four distinct aspects to collaboration with the partnerships team: these are alignment on value propositions, integration with the folks on the operations team, compliance and risk management coordination, and knowledge sharing with the support team. Without any of these in place, your partnerships team is too siloed away from what’s going on in the rest of the organization and you ultimately won’t succeed collectively.
Let’s take a step back and look at how these work in practice. There’s some nuance here that I don’t want to miss. First off, sales teams need to understand partnership benefits if they’re going to position them effectively with clients.
With your operations team, you need seamless integration so onboarding happens without interruptions or issues. In a similar vein, you need coordination with regulatory and security for risk management and compliance purposes.
Finally, your support teams need up-to-date information on partner products so they can help your customers effectively.
Partnerships pull all of these together.
HOST: How can we, as a team, contribute to making partnerships more effective?
HAMID: Good communication is paramount. Before we even get started, we need really clear communication and goal alignment that brings everyone onto shared expectations. And your teams have to collaborate seamlessly.
From there, strong feedback loops give stakeholders plenty of opportunities to voice their concerns and highlight opportunities. This is how we continue to drive value.
HOST: Cool. Thanks, Hamid. It’s been a pleasure. That’s all for now – I know you’re busy so thanks a lot for sharing with us and our readership.
HAMID: Glad to help!
Thanks for joining us – tune in next time for more coffee with Advapay to get an insider’s view of who we are, what we do, and what we’re doing next.
Learn more about our solutions and how they align with your needs by contacting our consultants for a live demo and interactive session.
Advapay at stake:
How can Advapay can assist you in launching your fintech business?
• Assistance in EMI/PI licencing in the EEA/UK
• Registration of MSB company in Canada
• Delivery of a comprehensive Core banking system encompassing back-office and white-label applications for end-users
• Assistance in payment infrastructure development
• BaaS-solutions in collaboration with our partners – EEA/UK licenced EMIs and PIs
