What is your mission statement?

Our mission is to be the payment partner of choice for all merchants seeking to maximize their payments potential. We strive to reduce the burden of payments, open up borders with ease, and enable merchants to realize their business vision with data-driven insights.

Zooz aims to connect the world of payments, whether by connecting merchants to the world via our global payments platform; by connecting online and offline worlds to enhance customer experiences; or by connecting all payments components and channels to create a seamless and valuable payments process.

Where are you headquartered?

Our headquarters with our R&D team are located in  Israel – working in this major global high-tech hub is a huge advantage for our company, and we plan to open offices in the UK and San Francisco this coming year as part of our global expansion.

Who do you think will be the most influential figures (or companies) in FinTech, in 2015?

Alipay and Apple Pay – both alternative payment methods – will continue to emerge as key figures in the year to come. With time, we’ll see how Apple develops its payment method and makes it accessible for a broader audience (and not just iPhone 6 users). Similarly the Chinese e-wallet Alipay – the payment method associated with the e-commerce giant Alibaba – will continue to develop as an important payment partner, especially for companies looking to sell to Chinese audiences. Partnerships with other alternative payment methods, like Yandex in Russia and Boleto in Brazil, will also prove fruitful in 2015, as offering these payment methods will make global retailers’ more inviting to international shoppers.

What kind of year do you foresee for your company, and the industry as a whole?

For Zooz, this year will be focused on expansion, and we anticipate a number of enterprise merchants implementing our technology this year. We also plan to triple our staff, enabling us to develop and deliver more solutions and further drive the growth of our industry.

2015 promises to be an influential year in terms of FinTech development and awareness. We’re already seeing more media excitement around financial technology, and a number of companies emerging as leaders in this developing frontier. We’ve started to see the deployment of omni-channel technologies, such as beacons, which merge the online and offline experience, but there is still a lot of room to develop this space and create personalization technology to genuinely unify shopping across all channels.

As the long-awaited October 2015 liability shift deadline fast approaches, EMV technology has become an important opportunity for FinTech growth: industry players would be wise to focus their efforts on further developing hardware and software that can be easily integrated and which addresses the card present and card not present (CNP) processing needs of merchants and customers.

What are your key targets for 2015?

In 2015, we are aiming to expand our operations and product development to serve more merchants, develop more solutions, and maximize payment efficiency globally.

What are the key hurdles for growing your business this year?

FinTech is developing into a major industry, and, as such, we are working within a dynamic space that is constantly changing. It is both challenging and exhilarating to work within a sphere that demands of us constant innovation and rethinking of our offering.

What are your thoughts on the current state of FinTech?

FinTech is an up-and-coming industry, and there is a lot of opportunity to create impactful technology. In the payments sphere specifically, there is a lot of room for growth and improvement: Looking ahead, we need to find ways to upgrade payment practices, remove the barriers to shopping across channels, and enable consumers to purchase and pay comfortably across borders. While many solutions exist and are being developed to address these problems, as FinTech continues to develop the technology available will become ever more seamless and optimized. We’re excited to be a part of the innovation and the evolutions ahead.

(image credit: Zooz)