Navigating growth and dynamic market challenges: Insights from Céline Dufétel at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023

Our President and COO, Céline Dufétel, took to the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt to shed light on her experience in payments and unveil our ambitious plans for the future. During her session, Céline covered a number of topics, including:

• Growing over 40% this year in our core commerce and fintech segment and scaling in the US 
• Powering payments performance for businesses around the world 
• The future trends that will impact the global payments market 

Amidst shifts in macroeconomic conditions, one thing remains steadfast: Céline is leading her team and Checkout.com on a path of growth, by focussing us all on the performance we deliver to our customers.  Here’s a little more on what Céline covered:  

How is Checkout.com navigating growth amid complexity? 

It’s been an exciting year for Checkout.com. We’ve been on a fantastic growth journey, with our core business serving commerce and fintech merchants expanding by over 40%! Notably, we've welcomed trailblazers like StubHub and GE Healthcare in the US, Vinted in Europe, and Sony Electronics, Ant, and Alibaba in the Asia-Pacific region.  These are great brands that demand performance in every market they operate in.

Céline summed it up: "We help abstract the complexity of payments for global enterprises and focus on helping them perform at their best". This is exemplified by the introduction of four new innovative products this year, reaffirming our commitment to enhancing the merchant experience. These products include Integrated Platforms designed for marketplaces, Issuing for streamlined merchant card generation, Intelligent Acceptance employing Machine Learning to boost conversion rates, and Identity Verification, ensuring swift and secure customer authentication in seconds.

Performance in the digital economy takes focus and precision, “if I highlight one innovation last year, it’s with Identity Verification.  A visual authentication service that uses real time imagery and AI to ensure identities.  It has use cases way beyond digital payments, and is already used by Docusign and Uber Eats to ensure accuracy and security in their digital experience.”

Beyond our product innovation strategy, our growth is rooted in diversification across multiple industries and multiple geographies. As Céline explains, "we serve a range of fintechs, actively engage with neo-banks, participate in the buy-now-pay-later space, cater to ecommerce players, collaborate with streaming giants, gaming platforms, and food delivery services. Our portfolio encompasses a wide spectrum of industries." This diversity is our secret sauce in this constantly evolving landscape. It gives us a rock-solid foundation to thrive in the face of change.

What is Checkout.com hearing from customers?

The core of what sophisticated enterprise merchants are looking for hasn’t changed, they seek performance, price and service. At Checkout.com, we do our best to excel at all three:

• Performance - We’re always striving to give our merchants the very best acceptance rates. When you’ve worked so hard, and spent so much money to bring a customer to the checkout button, it’s critical that that payment experience doesn’t fail. 
• Price - Payments is a competitive space. Having a good cost structure so we can pass on the economies of scale to our merchants is crucial.
• Service - Out of the box solutions with limited customization or personalized service, limit merchants’ potential. With our focus on payments expertise, we partner hand in hand with our merchants helping them optimize their payments, solve problems and achieve the best outcomes for their business. 

What's next for Checkout.com?

Our mission for the future is clear: grow alongside existing merchants, strengthen market share, and drive the best digital payment performance. 

Our volumes in the US have grown by more than 80% year-on-year, and we're gearing up for a big 2024 in the US including rolling out our platform capabilities.

As Céline pointed out, "We have strong European roots and a longstanding presence in the Middle East and APAC, and the US is our latest adventure on the commercial front. It's all about exciting partnerships, like the ones we've formed with GE Healthcare and StubHub."

The outlook on global payments for 2024

Despite concerns about ecommerce growth in 2023, Céline doubled down on Checkout.com's unwavering belief in the ongoing digitization of payments. This transformation extends beyond ecommerce to encompass everything from streaming to gaming and beyond. She’s especially fascinated by the blurring lines between the physical and digital worlds, where online payments for offline pickups are becoming increasingly common.

Céline finishes with an optimistic and enthusiastic tone about the future, stating, “The use cases of digital payments will continue to explode over the next decade, and I'm really excited to see continued innovation in the space”.

To learn more about the current state of global payments, download our High Performance Payments whitepaper, which sheds light on industry trends, emerging technologies, and best practices