Fintech Focus — February 2020

Every month we share a curated selection of people moves in fintech. If your colleagues or friends would like to subscribe to our newsletter, we’ve included a subscribe link here, or they can visit our website.

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February 2020

• Affirm: Erika White joined Affirm as Head of Communications and Corporate Marketing. Erika was previously Director of External Affairs at TPG.
• Airbnb: Catherine Powell joined Airbnb as Head of Experiences. Catherine was previously President of Disney Parks for the Western Region. Link
• Aliaswire: Jed Rice joined Aliaswire as Chief Executive Officer. Jed was previously General Manager of Global Business Development at PayPal. Link
• Andreessen Horowitz: Arianna Simpson joined a16z as a Partner on the crypto team. Arianna was the founder of Autonomous Partners, a crypto fund. Link
• Anthemis Group: Kate Sampson joined Anthemis Group as a Managing Director focused on insurtech. Kate was previously Vice President of Risk Solutions at Lyft. Link
• Balderton Capital: David Thévenon and Rana Yared both joined Balderton Capital as General Partners. David was previously a Partner at SoftBank’s Vision Fund where he led a number of the firm’s fintech growth investments. Rana was previously a Partner on the Goldman Sachs Growth Equity team where she focused on fintech investments and helped start Goldman’s crypto efforts. Link
• Billtrust: Mark Shifke joined Billtrust as Chief Financial Officer. Mark was previously Chief Financial Officer at Green Dot Bank. Link
• Built Technologies: Scott Clatur and Jim Fraser joined Built Technologies as Head of People and Culture and Director of Commercial Real Estate Strategy, respectively. Scott was previously Vice President of People at Visual Lease. Jim was previously Executive Vice President of Commercial Lending at Axos Bank. Link
• Checkr: Naeem Ishaq joined Checkr as Chief Financial Officer. Naeem was previously Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer at Circle. Link
• CircleUp: Amanda Burr Wood was promoted from Head of Lending Operations to Vice President of Strategy and Operations at CircleUp.
• Coinbase: Surojit Chatterjee and Lawrence Zlatkin joined Coinbase as Chief Product Officer and Vice President of Tax, respectively. Surojit was previously Vice President of Product Management for Google Shopping. Lawrence was previously Counsel at Baker McKenzie. Link Link
• Compass: Sara Patterson and Pamela Thomas-Graham joined Compass as Chief People Officer and member of the Board of Directors, respectively. Sara was previously Vice President of Human Resources and Head of Talent Management at Walmart eCommerce. Pamela is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Dandelion Chandelier Digital Media. Link Link
• Fifth Wall: Dan Wenhold and Vik Chawla were both promoted to Partners of the Real Estate Technology investment team at Fifth Wall. Josh Schwartz, Katherine Miller and Sarah Liu were also promoted to Vice President. Link
• Gusto: Bernard Coleman joined Gusto as Head of Employee Engagement. Bernard was previously Global Head of Inclusive Engagement at Uber. Link
• JPMorgan Chase: Oron Gill Haus joined JPMorgan Chase as Head of Digital Technology for the Consumer Bank. Oron was previously Chief Technology Officer for Enterprise Products and Platforms at Capital One. Link
• Lemonade: Jeff Brooks joined Lemonade as Chief Marketing Officer. Jeff was previously Chief Marketing Officer at Casper. Link
• LendingClub: Annie Armstrong joined LendingClub as Chief Risk Officer. Annie was previously Global Head of Financial Risk at Uber. Link
• Lyric: Maggie Lang joined Lyric as Senior Vice President of Commercial. Maggie was previously Head of Guest Experience and Loyalty at Kimpton Hotels and Restaurants.
• Petal: Kaustav Das joined Petal as Chief Risk Officer. Kaustav was previously Chief Risk Officer at Kabbage. Link
• Point: Annie Worthington joined Point as Head of Human Resources. Annie was previously Global Vice President of Human Resources at Fluidigm.
• Prudence Holdings: Jordan Viniar joined Prudence Holdings as Principal where he will focus on real estate tech and fintech investments. Jordan was previously an investor at Goldman Sachs Investment Partners where he focused on fintech investments, including his investment in Built Technologies. Link
• Ramp: Charley Ma joined Ramp as Head of Growth. Charley was previously NYC Growth Manager at Plaid. Link
• Redpoint Ventures: Logan Bartlett joined Redpoint Ventures as Managing Director. Logan was previously a Principal at Battery Ventures. His prior investments include Stripe and Root Insurance. Link
• ShapeShift: Lisa Loud joined ShapeShift as Chief Operating Officer. Lisa was previously Chief Operating Officer and Chief Marketing Officer at BitMEX. Link
• Stealth Mode: Tim Cantwell is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of a real estate tech startup currently in stealth mode. Tim was previously Chief Financial Officer at GE Ventures.
• Stealth Mode: Mahima Chawla is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of a company currently in stealth mode. Mahima was previously a Product Manager at Square.
• Stripe: Jim Stoneham and Trish Walsh joined Stripe as Chief Marketing Officer and General Counsel, respectively. Jim was previously Chief Marketing Officer and Senior Vice President of Growth at New Relic. Trish was previously Executive Vice President and Chief Legal Officer at Voya Financial.
• Summer: John Whitfield joined Summer as Head of Engineering. John was previously Engineering Manager at Plaid. Link
• Tally: Jan Chong joined Tally as the company’s first Vice President of Engineering. Jan was previously Senior Director of Engineering at Twitter. Link
• Tradeshift: Tony Alvarez, Raphael Bres and Janet Heppner-Jones joined Tradeshift as Vice President of Network, Chief Product Officer and Vice President of North America Sales, respectively. Tony was previously Senior Vice President at SAP. Raphael was previously General Manager of Financial Management at FinancialForce. Janet was previously Vice President of Digital Sales for the Americas at Baker Hughes. Link
• Underscore VC: Lily Lyman was promoted to Partner at Underscore VC. Lily leads investments in insurtech. Link
• Upstart: James Moorhead joined Upstart as Chief Marketing Officer. James was previously Chief Operating Officer at Metromile.
• WeWork: Kirthiga Reddy and Marissa Shorenstein joined WeWork as a member of the Board of Directors and Chief Communications Officer, respectively. Kirthiga is a Partner at SoftBank Investment Advisors. Marissa was previously President of the Northern Region at AT&T. Link Link

What We’re Following

• Quartz article: “Fintech has finally cracked the US banking sector”
• CNBC article: “Big banks are set up to ‘kill’ change”, says founder of $2.5 billion fintech firm Monzo
• WSJ article: “More companies help employees with ‘financial wellness’ plans: services range from emergency-savings funds and payroll advances to student-loan-repayment support”
• Fortune article: “Why the world’s toughest activist hedge fund is after SoftBank”
• Economist article: ”Technology is poised to upend America’s property market: at long last, the world’s biggest asset market will be shaken up”

See you next month!

Catherine, Elizabeth, Hugh, Marissa and Scott

Intersection Growth Partners is a retained executive search firm that builds the leadership teams transforming financial services. Our clients include challenger fintechs, global financial institutions and leading investors in the space.