OUR TEAM
As Founder and CEO of Secure Payments Academy (SPA) and Smart Commerce International Ltd. (SCIL), he advises financial institutions, payment networks, fintechs, governments, merchants, and technology providers on digital transformation, payments modernization, innovation strategy, and the adoption of emerging technologies. His expertise spans payment processing, card payments, EMV, mobile and digital payments, digital identity, authentication, open banking, digital currencies, artificial intelligence, fraud prevention, and cybersecurity.
Throughout his career, Mansour has founded, built, and successfully exited multiple businesses in the payments and smart card sectors, including ventures that were acquired by leading global technology companies. Following the acquisition of one of his companies by ACI Worldwide, he held senior management positions responsible for smart card and payment technology initiatives. He has also served as a Board Member of GlobalPlatform and Chair of its Marketing Centre, contributing to the development and adoption of global standards for secure digital services.
A sought-after speaker, consultant, and trainer, Mansour has worked with organizations across North America, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Asia-Pacific, and Africa. Through his consulting and training activities, he has helped thousands of executives and professionals understand, evaluate, and implement payment, identity, and digital commerce technologies. His combination of entrepreneurial success, strategic insight, and hands-on industry experience makes him a trusted advisor to organizations navigating the future of financial services and digital commerce.
In the payments sector, Christie has provided advisory services to clients on EMV implementation, virtual currencies, fintech, mobile payments and wallets, P2P payments, debit payments, smart cards, payments and loyalty programs, simulating payments markets, and benchmarking machine learning algorithms for e-commerce authentication. He has also conducted payments market studies on payments markets in Canada, USA, Europe, Tunisia and South Africa. TSI publishes the Canadian Payments Forecast and Canadian Consumer Payments Survey on an annual basis and has conducted foresight reports on virtual currencies, BNPL and tokenization. He has presented papers on the adoption of advanced payments technologies at payments conferences in Canada, USA, UK, Australia and South Africa.
In the broadcast sector, Christie has been managing and executing projects on broadcasting accessibility for Deaf and hard-of-hearing communities. He has managed four grant funded programs focused on live captioning. For more details on these projects please see the Live Captioning Canada website.
He has designed and delivered in-depth technology and regulatory training programs to fixed and mobile operators, broadcasters, regulators, training institutes and government ministries from more than 20 countries around the world under the auspices of the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization.
An electronics engineer by background, Christie went on to complete a post-graduate diploma in signal processing and control systems. He worked as development engineer in the aersopace sector for several years before moving into engineering management and then project and program management. He has a certificate in Program Management from the American Graduate University and an MBA from the University of South Africa. Christie has worked at the sharp end of technological innovation and co-founded a number of technology startups that successfully commercialized their products.
During her career at JPMorgan Chase, where she served as Senior Vice President for more than 12 years, Kathy led the development and deployment of innovative payment and banking technology initiatives. She managed the design and implementation of electronic payment systems integrated into the retail banking environment, helping improve customer experience, operational efficiency, and payment security.
One of her notable achievements was leading the implementation of one of the first fully integrated Mondex smart card programs, a significant milestone in the evolution of electronic payments and stored-value technologies. She also directed the development of debit card platforms and online banking applications that helped lay the foundation for modern digital banking and customer self-service services.
Kathy is recognized for combining strong business leadership with deep expertise in payments and banking technology. Her experience includes product development, payment system integration, strategic planning, program management, and innovation within highly regulated financial environments.
At Secure Payments Academy, Kathy shares practical insights gained from leading major payment and banking transformation initiatives, helping professionals understand the evolution of payments and the future direction of digital banking and financial services.
He has defined payments product strategies and specified software and services under those strategies for leading corporations including top tier banks, merchants, card networks, loyalty programs, crown corporations, telcos, credit unions, and governments.
Mike has developed in depth research analyses on payments topics including tokenization and ISO20022, and was the lead author of TSI’s report titled Retail Payments Tokenisation in Canada: The Paths to Success for Canadian Payments Stakeholders. Mike has co-chaired industry forums on prepaid cards, and multi-application card issuance. He has also lead Canadian Institute sessions on new payments technologies, prepaid, gift, and stored value cards, and payments compliance. Mike has also presented at multiple conferences including Payments Canada Summit, Canadian Institute, Cartes North America, and ACT Cardware.