Ripple (XRP) has announced that it has hired Sendi Young from Mastercard for heading the growth and expansion of RippleNet’s European operations.
The company has been trying to push its way through the SEC in the US over the last few months but so far, it has not had much success. So, it is only natural that Ripple starts looking into Europe as the next frontier for it to grow. With increasing talk of many central banks in Europe carrying out trials in digital currencies and with Ethereum competing with Ripple as the blockchain of choice for CBDC’s, the company has started feeling the heat and the need to grow globally and in a short time to head off some of the competition.
In this regard, the hiring of Young is a move in the right direction as she has over 15 years of experience in the fintech and payments industry and recently, she was the Digital and Fintech Global Lead at Mastercard where she has been working since the beginning of 2016. Her time at Mastercard would have given her a lot of experience in commercialization, bank-fintech partnerships, and business development, all of which are likely to be put to full use at Ripple (XRP).
“The underlying payments and banking infrastructure remain an obstacle to frictionless value exchange across borders and inclusion,” Young says. “I firmly believe that blockchain and crypto will be a game-changer to enhance today’s finance, by addressing its core inefficiencies. These technologies can make the global financial system fairer, more inclusive and more transparent.”.”
A quarter of Ripple’s customers are based out of Europe and the on-demand liquidity transactions have grown by over 250% as compared to last year, the company said. This is the reason for the company to start focussing on Europe especially and the need to appoint a Head to take care of its business in the region.
Asheesh Birla, general manager of RippleNet, comments: “Sendi’s appointment represents a huge opportunity for our European operations given her leadership experience, deep understanding of the payments landscape, and knowledge of how to grow and scale a network business.”
Ripple would hope that its renewed focus in this region would yield dividends in the long run and it would be able to push its case to many financial firms and banks in the region which would remove some of the heat and pressure that it is facing from the SEC over the last several months.