American Express is expanding its technology business while many companies are cutting jobs, and Visa, Mastercard and Discover are also hiring large technology teams.
The Card Network plans to employ approximately 1,500 people in the last three months of 2022, primarily in data science, software, and other technology roles, in addition to 3,600 technology workers. already added this year. This goes against the trend that tech companies will lay off more than 92,000 of his jobs in 2022. layoff.fyi.
said Luke Gebb, senior vice president of Amex Digital Labs. “Our earnings are good, so we can be aggressive at this point.”
New employers come as Amex is in the midst of an Enterprise Innovation Partners initiative. Amex combines the Corporate Strategic Partnerships Division, the Corporate Development/Technology Investment Group, and the Digital Lab. This is the part of the company that will benefit from the new hires. Visa and Mastercard also employ thousands of professionals in areas such as data management, security and cryptocurrencies.
Working across departments, Amex’s Enterprise Innovation Labs hopes to improve the company’s ability to anticipate consumer and merchant trends in two of Amex’s largest business lines: dining and travel. I’m here. The group also explores how digital identities will be used in the future to facilitate payment transactions and tracks new developments in artificial intelligence and cryptocurrencies.
Chonna Kasinger/Bloomberg
For example, Amex added the ability to purchase Non-fungible token As an incentive to spend more on the card. Amex says:metaversesuch as processing payments for virtual trips and other digital experiences.
Amex will invest in companies as part of the initiative and will work with these companies on product development with existing Amex teams. Part of the goal is to find opportunities for future merger and acquisition deals and add new products that can be incorporated into existing acquired fintechs such as Kabbage, Accertify and Resy.
“Now it’s becoming more and more important to do this,” said Geb. “Whether the future of the payments business has to do with the direction of Apple, Amazon, Google, or something else, this project will help us understand how digital technology will influence evolution. Amex Labs is a test zone that creates about 20 initiatives each year, piloting these products on the market to get a barometer of consumer and business needs. increase.
“You can do as much research as you want, with surveys or whatever, but until you get customer feedback, you never know for sure,” says Geb.As part of an initiative effort, Amex recently started testing amex roundupThis allows consumers to round up their transactions to $1, $5, or $10 increments and direct the funds to charity. Amex’s lab worked with Philanthropi, a tech startup that digitizes nonprofit donations, to build the technology behind Round-Up. Amex Ventures has also invested in Philanthropi.
“There’s no shortage of interesting companies,” said Lisa Marches, head of corporate development at Amex. Innovation never stops.”
Other recent projects include Collaboration with Google Supports virtual cards to support “autofill”. This eliminates the need to enter the 4-digit security code on the back of the plastic card at checkout. Amex Digital Labs worked with the Enterprise Partnership Group to execute the Google project. Other projects include work on co-branded cards with Hinton and Delta Airlines.
another product, send and split, is a partnership with PayPal that allows users to split group payments via PayPal or Venmo.
Glenda McNeil, Amex’s president of Enterprise Strategic Partnerships, said: “Putting all of this at the corporate level gives you visibility into all your business.” Amex last week reported earnings This beat analyst expectations, with earrings for the full year and 2023 broadly matching or slightly exceeding analyst expectations. At the financial results briefing, Chairman and CEO Steve Squery He said there was no indication that inflation or a potential recession was hurting payments volumes. “Technology investment has been stable over the past few years and we will continue to invest at the same level this year,” Squeri said in the earnings call.
Amex is expanding its business to find revenue streams that aren’t tied directly to payment processing. As a result, all three have added services that provide security or enable their customers to use new technologies such as blockchain and cryptocurrencies. Stock market volatility won’t affect Amex’s strategy, Geb said.
“Our goals are set for the medium to long term,” says Gebb. “We do not change our behavior based on short-term market fluctuations. Of course, we can adjust if these fluctuations affect medium-term trends. I don’t think
Visa and Mastercard are expanding their revenue streams beyond payment processing. Visa did not return a request for comment on how the slowdown in hiring in fintech hiring will affect its hiring plans. Current Jobs at Visa It includes 57 positions in business development, 51 positions in consulting, 50 positions in information technology, and 31 positions in data science. LinkedIn has listed over 3,800 new positions company-wide.
Discover Career Page lists over 340 IT jobs with a focus on data management and digital development. Discover also recently launched Data and analysis program. 2,700 job openings for Discover.recently entered Partnership with IBM Discover new payment and financial services use cases for cloud computing. Discover, visa When master Card It also reported strong earnings in its most recent quarter.
Mastercard’s public relations team said in an email that the card network has 1,300 job openings worldwide, 500 of which span US software engineering, product and design, and technical infrastructure. Earlier this year, Mastercard Add staff proactively The following year, he called the tech talent market “hot.”
Expanding Mastercard Development base in New Yorkand is in the process of hiring 500 staff with open banking and cryptocurrency expertise.
As a result of slowing fintech adoption, code developers will find opportunities with well-established financial firms, according to Brian Riley, co-head of payments at Mercator Advisory Group. “For some people, working in a traditional financial environment may seem like it lacks the coolness of working at a startup. When they do, IT staff will likely enjoy the security and opportunities of a global institution.”