Episode 2: Rodrigo Dantas e Silva - Americas Payments Leader at EY joins Daniel Hadgu and Minas Yohannes students from Georgia State. Tommy Marshall, Executive Director of the Georgia Fintech Academy moderates a discussion about the payments landscape worldwide. The team considers the recent Visa acquisition of Plaid for $5.3 billion. Daniel and Minas talk about their fintech company EthioPay.
FULL TRANSCRIPT IS AVAILABLE AT THIS LINK
https://borusgmy.sharepoint.com/:w:/g/personal/thomas_marshall_usg_edu/EUIreXP3m8lIgSW9dGyLlJsBHVkGRpt0XqIBsj0QtYUYWg?e=yWauU8
Welcome to the Georgia FinTech Academy podcast. The Georgia Fintech Academy is a collaboration between Georgia SpinTech Industry and the University System of Georgia. This talent development initiative addresses a massive demand for Fintech professionals and give learners the specialized education experiences needed to enter the FinTech sector.
Hi everyone. This is Tommy Marshall, the Executive Director of the Georgia FinTech Academy. Welcome to episode two of the Georgia FinTech Academy podcast. Its great to have all of you back here with us and we are excited that we're getting into this rhythm of hosting this podcast where we have an executive visitor from the FinTech industry along with students that have been involved or are involved today with the Georgia FinTech Academy. So at first I'd like to introduce you to Rodrigo Dantas e Silva. Rodrigo, thanks so much for being with us today.
Well, thank you for an invitation, Tommy. It's a pleasure to be here.
And tell us about yourself.
All right. So, I am the Americas Payments Leader for EY and that capacity of basically coordinate our teams and our offerings to serve the payments industry. And a little bit about my past, 10 years ago, a little more than that, I thought my career was over because I had worked a good chunk of it in financial services and strategy and the other good chunk of it in technology. And then someone invented the term FinTech and, [wala 00:01:48], I was saved. So, and that has been a lot of what I've been doing so far.
Fantastic. Thanks so much for being here. I mean, EY is such an amazing firm. Does, I think some really remarkable [thorough 00:02:04] leadership and delivery in the FinTech space and we are lucky, lucky, lucky to have you here in Atlanta. You've moved here to Atlanta. What's it been now? Three years?
A little less than three years ago. Yes.
Okay. And so we are just... Thanks for being here [inaudible 00:02:23]and we're,
All my pleasure [inaudible 00:02:24]
Appreciate for [inaudible 00:02:25]. So, Daniel, tell us about yourself.
Yeah, sure Tommy. So my name is Daniel Hadgu. Currently a first semester senior at Georgia State University. A co-founder of EthioPay, and this current summer I'm going to be interning at Vanguard doing investment management.
Oh great. And how did you get attracted to the Vanguard because they're not in Atlanta the last time I checked Malvern, Pennsylvania if I have my facts.
That's correct. So, I just applied online seeing it on there. And-
Are you a Boglehead?
Oh yes sir. Of course. And so I think the thing that attracted me to them and really liked the big three, which is Vanguard, BlackRock and Fidelity, is right now I think a lot of the things that are going on in the US, is decided by... The decisions are made in their corporate boardrooms because they owned an index bonds that democratize the stock market. And so a lot of decisions that are made in America will increasingly be made by smaller and smaller groups. And I think Vanguard is one of the three leaders that can make an effect. And so I wanted to be with the organ