Speakers
GCVA Global Conference 2023 welcomes a line up of exceptional speakers, key notes, panelists and much more during the two action-packed days.
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Day One - 1 March 2023
Adam Hobbs, Managing Director, Motivates & GCVA Co-Chair
With over 12 years’ experience within the Gift Card Industry, working for both Gift Card Agencies and Retailers directly. Adam has built a great understanding of how to create, manage and grow a Gift Card business. Currently the Managing Director of Motivates, home of the Lifestyle Gift Card.
Alastair Cowen, Data Analytics Manager, KPMG UK
Alastair works in KPMG’s Data & Analytics team, focusing on helping clients primarily in the retail sector make better decisions using insights from data. He oversees the day-to-day running of KPMG’s work with GCVA, which includes the half-yearly data collection, ranking and market analysis, and published report.
Amanda Myatt, Partner, Transaction Services, KPMG UK
Amanda is KPMG’s South Head of Retail and a Partner in the Transaction Services team with 20 years of transaction related work, performing due diligence to help companies buy, sell or raise debt. Amanda focuses on the consumer sector, most recently supporting Moonpig on its acquisition of Buyagift.
Andrew Johnson, CEO, Retail & Corporate, Diggecard
With over 25 years gift card experience gained working with Virgin, River Island, TK Maxx and The National Trust. Andrew was the first DG of the GCVA and now CEO Retail & Corporate for Diggecard. He is also President of Incentive Marketing Association Europe, (IMA Europe).
Annabel Le May, Senior Commercial Lead, Gift Cards and Concessions, John Lewis Partnership
Annabel Le May is the Commercial Lead for Gift Cards and Concessions at the John Lewis Partnership (John Lewis and Waitrose) After various Sales Leadership and Business Development roles, Annabel joined the Commercial team and is now responsible for the Partnership’s Corporate and Consumer Gift Card proposition and Third Party Concessions.
Deji Damola – Business Development Director, EMEA, Fiserv Gift Solutions
A business development executive specialising in revenue growth, strategic partnerships, and implementation of innovative payment solutions.
Em Stroud, Co Founder Laugh Think Play and Clown
Em Stroud is a clown, best-selling author and the co-founder of the new Global Movement Laugh, Think and Play. Em is an experienced performer and successful entrepreneur.
Gail Cohen – Director General of the GCVA
Gail is the Director General of the Gift Card and Voucher Association (GCVA). Her role is to lead the association, develop strategy, and set direction with the executive group; ensuring it represents its members and the industry across all key areas. This is the 9th GCVA Conference she has led and can’t quite believe how much it has grown, selling out this year. Apart from her passion for all things Gift Card – Gail loves to travel, cook, garden, quiz, word games and actively supports a number of charities. Her next adventure is to Madagascar and Reunion Island and plans to do a tandem sky drive for charity this year – watch this space.
Heather Rogers, Senior Director, eCommerce, Blackhawk Network
Heather has worked in the gift card industry for 16 years working at Red Letter Days, Travelzoo and Sodexo before joining Blackhawk Network. Since working at Blackhawk Network, Heather has headed up the Sales and Marketing for the B2B business, and now manages their eCommerce solutions for the business across Europe. Heather specialises in sales and marketing across B2B and B2C markets, working with some of the biggest brands in the world. Heather is also an Executive Board Member of the Gift Card & Voucher Association.
Hollis Thornton, Vice President, Client Success, TOTUS
Hollis Thornton is Vice President of Client Success at TOTUS Gift Card Management where her team oversees gift card issuance and program management for TOTUS clients. She has over 20 years in the gift card industry helping merchants improve their gift card programs and the marketing of their brands. Hollis was awarded the Incentive Marketing Association’s inaugural ‘Incentive Industry Influencer’ award and is Incentive Gift Card Coalition President.
Husain Makiya, CEO, YOUGotaGift
Husain has been involved in MENA start-ups for over 20 years. His earliest digital venture as co-founder was Zawya.com, a leading business intelligence platform which he managed for over a decade before exiting to Thomson Reuters. He also co-founded Honeybee Tech Ventures in 2011, an incubator for digital ventures and YOUGotaGift in 2013 where he currently is CEO. He earned an MBA and a bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from Imperial College, London.
Jenny Parris, Chief Revenue Officer, SVS
In her role as Chief Revenue Officer of SVS, Jenny is responsible for the company’s sales and marketing strategy, products, and the development of global channel partnerships. An entrepreneurial sales and marketing leader with more than 16 years at SVS, Jenny has nurtured significant sales and revenue growth. With a reputation for managing multiple complex projects concurrently, Jenny has developed teams of specialists across the USA, Europe and Asia-Pacific. Jenny holds an MBA from Indiana University-Southeast.
Jinesh Vohra, CEO, Sprive
CEO and founder of an award winning FinTech, Sprive which helps homeowners in the UK become mortgage free, faster and save interest. Prior to starting the company, he spent 14 years at the Investment Bank, Goldman Sachs.
Malcolm Berg, VP Business and Account Development – UK, Nordics & Eire, SVS
Malcolm is VP Business & Account Development SVS, responsible for business and account development across EMEA. His sales and marketing career has spanned some 36 years with senior management and board level experience in retail, retail financial services, insurance, prepaid and payments; providing solutions for B2B, B2C, partnership and multi-channel sales.
Peter Dabrowa, CEO, Wonde
Peter is the co-founder and CEO of Wonde, a data solution trusted by 27,000+ schools. At the start of the pandemic, the team built Evouchers.com to effortlessly provide free school meal vouchers to over a million recipients and now continues to focus on support and welfare within the sector.
Siobhan Moore, Partner, Keystone Law
A commercial lawyer with a focus on the gift card, e-money and payment services sector. She advises on business strategy, new product structure, business expansion, formulating procedures, regulatory conundrums and contracts (B2Band B2C). Siobhan is GCVA co-chair of the executive board and PIF chair of the board of directors.
Steph MacNeill, Senior Commercial Manager, Tesco Bank & 3rd Party Services
Steph is responsible for the Tesco and 3rd Party Gift Card Programs at Tesco in the UK and Ireland. Joining the industry 7 years ago with a background in financial services marketing she puts customers first and is passionate about using data and insight to deliver growth.
Stoytcho Vlaykov, Managing Director, Cashwave
Stoytcho Vlaykov is the co-founder and CEO of Cashwave.com, a B2B distribution platform for digital gift cards offering 400 brands in 32 countries and 12 currencies across Europe. Over the last 6 years, Stoytcho has transformed a struggling microenterprise with 2 employees offering 5 gift cards in 2 markets into a leading Pan-European digital gift card provider.
Day One GCVA 101 Speakers
Kim Dinan, Head of Gift Cards, LEO Retail
Kim is responsible for driving LEGO Retail’s Gift Card expansion – 32 countries and all distribution channels; LEGO.com. LEGO® Stores, Malls and B2B. Previously, Kim has worked as a consultant supporting international retailers; with a Gift Card platform provider and has managed Gift Card programmes for several major UK retailers.
Aron Alexander, Founder & CEO, WeGift
Serial entrepreneur with a background in technology, retail and payments. CEO and founder of WeGift, an award winning, market leading infrastructure for sending and spending digital value.
Ben Rabb, COO, USA Division, BitCard
Ben is COO for BitCard, which offers a gift card easily redeemable for cryptocurrency. He is a payments industry veteran with expertise in global payments and digital currency. Previously, Ben was CEO of ROXE, which built blockchain payment and remittance products, and Head of Global Network Product Support for Visa.
Paul Swinton, co-CEO and Co-Founder, B4B Payments
Paul Swinton is co-CEO and co-founder of B4B Payments, a UK headquartered fintech with offices in Europe and the USA enabling companies to reduce costs and increase efficiency in managing corporate expenditure using prepaid cards and global payouts. Paul also formerly served as Chairman of the Payments Innovation Forum (PIF), the not-for-profit industry body representing the fintech and payments sector.
Miranda Graesser, Head of Gift Cards & Sainsbury's Energy, Sainsbury’s Group
Miranda has over a decade of experience in retail leadership, beginning her career at the sharp end in store leadership roles before moving into strategic commercial roles. She got hooked on the gift card world and its wealth of opportunity while managing the John Lewis Partnership gift card programme. Continuing with her passion Miranda now leads the Sainsbury’s group gift card programme which spans across four brands, Sainsbury’s, Argos, Habitat and Tu Clothing, with a team managing all aspects of the gift card, MRV and card linking offer. Alongside Gift Cards the Sainsbury’s white labelled Energy proposition is also under her remit and Miranda is a proud member of the GCVA Executive team.
Bill Alexander, Chairman, Motivates
Chairman and Co-Owner of Motivates, and formerly CEO of Redletterdays until a successful sale in 2017. As a B-Leader, he works with companies who wish to become a B-Corp. In 2022 he successfully steered Motivates to B-Corp Certification.
Todd Tomlin, Chief Operating Officer and Co-Founder, Ncentiva
Todd has been in the gift card, loyalty and payments sectors for 15 years working with Hyatt Hotels, Expedia, Hotels.com and others. Todd is the Chief Operating Officer and co-founder of Ncentiva, an alternative payout disbursement platform, B2B gift card distributor and gift card consultancy.
Julie Barbier-Leblan, Founder & CEO, Merit Incentives
Julie Barbier-Leblan is a serial entrepreneur with 15 years of experience in disrupting innovative technologies and strategic partnerships. She founded Merit Incentives, one of the fastest growing start-up in global engagement technology and solutions start-ups in the GCC and closed a 5M USD-Series A round with GCC VCs in 2021.
Keith Brand, Co-Founder TOTUS Gift Card Management and Co-Founder TheGiftCardCentre.co.uk
Keith has been a gift card industry leader for 20+ years as co-Founder of TOTUS, a US based company which issues and manages multi-channel gift card programs for digital native brands, and also as co-Founder of TheGiftCardCentre.co.uk and developer of the UK’s first gift card mall programs in the mid-2000s.
Heather Rogers, Senior Director, eCommerce, Blackhawk Network
Heather has worked in the gift card industry for 16 years working at Red Letter Days, Travelzoo and Sodexo before joining Blackhawk Network. Since working at Blackhawk Network, Heather has headed up the Sales and Marketing for the B2B business, and now manages their eCommerce solutions for the business across Europe. Heather specialises in sales and marketing across B2B and B2C markets, working with some of the biggest brands in the world. Heather is also an Executive Board Member of the Gift Card & Voucher Association.
Day Two - 2 March 2023
Alex Preece, CEO & Co-Founder, Tillo
Alex Preece has a wealth of experience in the fintech retail payments space. He co-founded Tillo in 2016 and in 2010 he also co-founded the first UK daily deals platform which was acquired by MoneySupermarket.com PLC the following year. Tillo has revolutionised the digital gift card market with its innovative platform that connects the world’s most popular brands with fintechs and enterprises looking to drive sustainable and profitable growth.
Aron Alexander, Founder & CEO, WeGift
Serial entrepreneur with a background in technology, retail and payments. CEO and founder of WeGift, an award winning, market leading infrastructure for sending and spending digital value.
Ashumi S, CEO & Founder, MAD Global
Ashumi S is the Founder and CEO at MAD Global, a Top 100 CreaTech Company in the UK. She is a multidisciplinary Creative, Producer and Innovator working in the Web3, Metaverse and NFT space. She is also a panelist, keynote speaker, and lecturer on the importance of including gender and diversity when creating new digital realities and translating luxury in the metaverse.
Briony Robertson, VP of People, Tillo
My background in the people field has come from working within diverse industries from a large national charity, advertising and business intelligence. I moved to Tillo 4 years ago and here I lead on the people agenda covering, HR, Talent Acquisition, Reward and Benefits and Learning and Development as well as being part of the Senior Leadership Team to drive the overall business agenda.
Chris Ronald, VP EMEA Incentives, Blackhawk Network
A mere 5 years in the industry but proud to lead the Blackhawk Network EMEA team for B2B Incentives Rewards and Benefits. Passionate about Branded Payments that turn transactions into experiences. Empowering brands to connect & build loyalty with their customers & employees using giftcards, codes and prepaid products.
Dan Brookman, CEO, Toggle & Airship
Dan Brookman is the CEO of Toggle (usetoggle.com) a SaaS platform that enables over 500 hospitality brands across 4000 locations to sell digital and physical gift cards, experiences, retail products, pay-it-forwards and tickets. Dan is a seasoned marketeer and is also responsible for Airship.co.uk, a CRM platform that helps hospitality drive loyalty.
Dan Miller, Commercial Operations Manager, M&S B2C Gift Cards
Dan’s background is in retail, with a particular focus on commercial and operational strategy. He has been a manager in M&S stores and took a leading role within M&S Energy. Within gift cards, Dan is focused on operational effectiveness, whilst championing innovation and M&S’ market leading designs.
Don Williams, Partner - Retail Sector, KPMG
Don has over 30 years of experience of advising clients in the retail sector initially as an audit partner and National Head of Sectors at BDO. His clients are, predominantly, private (family) or private equity owned and focused on managed growth to maximise shareholder value. Don joined KPMG in late 2014 and continues his focus on the retail sector with a view to building on the existing strength of the firm’s retail franchise and leveraging existing experience and services that are currently employed effectively with other sectors. Although based In London, he is service line and geographically agnostic. Specifically he seeks to help clients with some of the key opportunities and challenges that the sector faces: supply chain and operational efficiency, identification and effective penetration of international markets, the world of omni-channel, and the effective collection and analysis of data together with the systems and processes that are required to achieve this… And helping business
Eoghan Thompson – Director of Skills & Learning, KPMG
Eoghan is a Director and Skills within KPMG’s Government, Infrastructure and Healthcare Practice. He supports organisations of all sizes identify their future skills needs and then build those skills in house.
Eoin Whyte – Chief Revenue Officer & Co-Founder, Savvy
Eoin leads Savvy’s partner programme, and oversees all aspects of customer acquisition and retention across Savvy’s international direct and partner sales channels. He also leads Savvy’s new product development initiatives, and was Chairman of the Gift Card & Voucher Association from 2015-2021.
Glenn Sizer – Head of Prepaid & Subscription, Currys
Glenn has over 20 years of retail experience, predominantly with Currys and heads up their gift card and subscriptions business. Glenn is also, proudly part of the GCVA Exec.
Hollis Thornton, Vice President, Client Success, TOTUS
Hollis Thornton is Vice President of Client Success at TOTUS Gift Card Management where her team oversees gift card issuance and program management for TOTUS clients. She has over 20 years in the gift card industry helping merchants improve their gift card programs and the marketing of their brands. Hollis was awarded the Incentive Marketing Association’s inaugural “Incentive Industry Influencer” award and is Incentive Gift Card Coalition President.
James Malia, Managing Director UK & Ireland, Prezzee
Leading Prezzee’s UK expansion, James Malia is passionate about promoting the Prezzee brand and ideology: that we can all use a little more Human Interaction – known by Prezzee as ‘HI’, the antidote to AI – in our everyday lives. Prezzee’s mission is to ignite human connections through remarkable digital gifting moments.
Joseph Robinson, Director of Consulting, GlobalData
Joseph has a track record of delivering strategic insight to leading companies in the Retail, FMCG and Financial Services sectors, including Tesco, Disney, eBay, IKEA, Reckitt Benckiser, and American Express. Prior to GlobalData, Joseph held retail insight and consultancy roles at Verdict Research and Conlumino.
Kathy Heath, CEO, Healthy Minds Club
Kathy Heath has over 20 years experience in senior leadership positions across the Financial Services ecosystem on a global basis. Kathy speaks 4 languages and lives in the North West with her 10 year old son and her husband. As a long time leader of people, Kathy is passionate about people & wellbeing and has founded 2 wellbeing companies. Most recently the Healthy Minds Club, the UK’s first positive health & wellbeing gift card & membership platform. We provide personalised mental, physical & financial wellbeing solutions to prevent issues from occurring in the first place helping people to thrive in their lives.
Katie Wilkinson – Managing Director, Jigsaw Business Solutions
Katie left the banking industry to join Jigsaw and the world of gift cards in early 2016 as their Head of Operations, a team of one! Joining a start-up in its early years allowed Katie to experience every part of Jigsaw – pitch preparation and delivery, partner management, lead generation, project management, invoicing and financial reconciliation, order processing, and customer service. In 2017 she took on the role of Client Director allowing her to work more closely with Jigsaw’s ever-growing portfolio of retail clients whilst also working alongside Jigsaw’s two owners to drive the business forward. Katie’s latest role change came in January 2022 when she made the move to head up the company as Managing Director. She is enjoying working closely with her team of passionate and knowledgeable people to lead Jigsaw, their clients, and their partners into their 10th year and beyond!
Lucio Marazzi, European Partnership Director, lastminute.com
Business development expert with a particular aptitude for creating new revenue streams and building strong long-term relationships with both clients and partners. Sport and travel lover, father of two kids. More than 12 years spent creating new alternative sales channels inside lastminute.com group with a strong b2b focus. His business mantra is “simplify to amplify” and gift cards are not only a payment method, but “a real stand alone product”.
Miranda Graesser, Head of Gift Cards & Sainsbury's Energy, Sainsbury’s Group
Miranda has over a decade of experience in retail leadership, beginning her career at the sharp end in store leadership roles before moving into strategic commercial roles. She got hooked on the gift card world and its wealth of opportunity while managing the John Lewis Partnership gift card programme. Continuing with her passion Miranda now leads the Sainsbury’s group gift card programme which spans across four brands, Sainsbury’s, Argos, Habitat and Tu Clothing, with a team managing all aspects of the gift card, MRV and card linking offer. Alongside Gift Cards the Sainsbury’s white labelled Energy proposition is also under her remit and Miranda is a proud member of the GCVA Executive team.
Molly Pemberton, Group Director of Retail, Reward Gateway
I’m responsible for managing and growing our world class employee discount and reward redemption programmes. My role includes responsibility for partnerships, operations, commercial ownership and product innovation of SmartSpending™ and the Reward Marketplace, adopted by over 4000 Reward Gateway clients and their 6.5 million employees worldwide.
Nick Rosa, Metaverse Strategy Lead Europe & Growth Market, Accenture
Nicola “Nick” Rosa is a creative technologist, experience designer, and digital transformation specialist, who previously worked for Google, Spotify, IBM IX, Yahoo!, and Atari; and is now part of Accenture in their Metaverse Continuum Business Group where he is the Metaverse Strategy Lead for Europe & Growth Markets. Nick is also a Director at the Academy of International Extended Reality (AIXR) a non-profit entity producing the annual VR Awards. He is the co-host and co-author of a podcast series called “Field of View” where he interviews entrepreneurs, researchers, and pioneers in the field of Extended Reality and the Metaverse and is available on all the major platforms including YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music. Nick has also been speaking at multiple international events such as AWE, Oculus Connect, Fyuz, and CogX, and his first book “Understanding the Metaverse: A Business and Ethical Guide” was published by Wiley worldwide on October 27, 2022.
Noelle Reno, Global Marketing Director, SmartMedia Tech
Noelle is an experienced marketer and business development strategist having worked with leading brands including Verizon, Accenture, Kering Group, Four Seasons, Peroni, BBC World, Rosewood Hotels, and the Huffington Post. She has led global digital marketing teams and is an expert within the creator economy. She is a known voice in the women in web3 community.
Rob Coulstock, Commercial Development Director EMEA, InComm Payments
Rob is the Director of Commercial Development for InComm Payments in EMEA, and has over 20 years experience covering the whole breadth of the Prepaid and Gift Card industries. During his time Rob has been involved in the Management of B2B and B2C Gift Voucher, Gift Card and eGift Card programs, sales and distribution and has extensive experience in the provision of Gift Card related services to retailers, agencies and processors throughout EMEA. More recently Rob has been responsible for InComm’s Business Development, InComm’s open loop products and services and supporting the ever expanding emerging and alternative payments landscape across EMEA
Steve Leigh, Director, PR Agency One
Steve works with businesses ranging from the FTSE to fast-growing SMEs, helping them grow profile and better understand and measure their reputations. Within the financial services sector, he has worked as a consultant to most major banks and many leading insurance companies, as well as advising GCVA, PIF and One4All.
Day Two GCVA 101 Speakers
Lisa Lloyd, Psychologist & Psychotherapist, It’s Time for Change
Lisa helps organisations become places where employees excel, teams are dynamic, and people are happy. As a psychologist and psychotherapist her mantra is simple – ‘get people right, get business right’. She shapes culture around positive wellbeing, psychological safety, and meaningful performance. Her ‘Beyond the Water Cooler‘ podcast supports that mission.
Siobhan Moore, Partner, Keystone Law
A commercial lawyer with a focus on the gift card, e-money and payment services sector. She advises on business strategy, new product structure, business expansion, formulating procedures, regulatory conundrums and contracts (B2Band B2C). Siobhan is GCVA co-chair of the executive board and PIF chair of the board of directors.