$14 billion in payment fees. One startup bold enough to change that. In this special episode of Below the Fold, recorded live at the Dubai FinTech Summit, Harry Gill, Founder and Chairman of Pay10, shares how his UAE-based fintech became the first to go live under the Central Bank’s Open Finance framework—unlocking faster, cheaper, and more inclusive digital payments across the region. From real-time settlements to building a full-stack payment ecosystem, Harry breaks down what it takes to innovate inside strict regulation—and why Open Finance could unlock $10 billion in savings for UAE merchants alone. 🎙️ Hosted by: Shadi Dawi
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📡 In collaboration with @BelowTheFoldPodcast @launchfoundryai @datewithtech @dubaifintechsummit
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[00:00:00] Good afternoon everyone. This is another episode for Date With Tech Podcast, uh, brought to you by Trescon, uh, Launch Foundry and Below The Fold. And this is an interesting episode actually today with Harry Gill, the chairman and founder of Pay10. Thank you for joining this episode. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me here.
Pay10 was the first FinTech to go live under the central banks open finance framework, which is very interesting. So what did that moment mean for the company and for the region as well? I think that's, uh, a lot of hard work, which has gone to achieve that milestone and budget. Our entire team in Pay10, to be one of the first UAE based entities to go live in the open bank.
Framework. The effort was not just by us. It's a, it's a collaborative effort with the central bank team as well, with supervision team. To make this happen, of [00:01:00] course we have to build the technology and everything. UAE has been a leading in a lot of things in, in the region. And again, this time, UAE has been leading in open banking VRP solution.
There has been open banking solutions across GCC, but, uh, UA E is the first nation. Central Bank of UAE is the first nation to launch VRP framework, first Nation in the world. First Nation. In this region. In this region, and probably the top five in the world see O Open Finance. Primarily. There are two functions which really help.
Uh. Customers or merchants, uh, businesses. One is the payment initiation. So now if you are a customer and you had a patent wallet, you could initiate money instantly from your bank account by linking your bank account to open banking framework and send money, scan the QR code and the merchant, the shop business, and you would, will receive the money instantly.
Right? So it's a, it's a game changing regulation and framework and the experience. Is that with the click of button, you could send payments, it will pull money from [00:02:00] your, with your author authorization, will pull money from your bank account and same, same second transfer the money to the merchant. That's one aspect of it and the open finance aspect of it, because the data, we've got access to open finance, it could really help shortlist your profile with your data and mm-hmm.
And offer you lending as well by the banks. Oh, right. So we work as an intermediary between the banks and the merchants. To make this, uh, relationship happen. And in terms of UAE, there's a heavy cost Saving businesses could save 60 to 70% cost on their payment, uh, infrastructure, which they use to receive payments.
Likes of merchants today, pay two 2.5% could end up paying 0.6, 0.5% and get the money instantly. That's a huge, let's not forget. UAE had last year, and when I say UAE, the merchants, the businesses in UAE paid 14 billion s as payment cost. To receive money in the businesses, which could go down by 10 billion if there's a hundred percent adoption above open finance.
And let me ask you, what [00:03:00] advantages does payan, uh, what advantages does payan, uh, platform offer over traditional card, uh, card based systems? One is the settlement, which is instant, same time, real time settlement, and the cost. Which is 70% lesser for both merchants and customers? Uh, no. For merchants, for merchants and for customers, it's a smoother journey from a regulatory standpoint.
You've secured three core licenses in the UAE. Uh, correct me if I'm wrong, what does, what does that enable you to do than others? It's a complete financial ecosystem as we can create. So from, if you had three license, which we have is RPS category three and SBF license and open banking license, just open banking license itself.
It just allows you to be intermediary between the merchant and banks. I. SVF license is a wallet license, so you could acquire customers like yourself and myself. We could have a wallet and RPS Category three license is a merchant acquiring license. So some companies go for merchant acquiring license, some.
Some companies have the [00:04:00] wallet license. Some companies have the open banking, but we have all three. So we could really make the journey from the customer to the merchant to the settlement, a complete financial ecosystem, payment suite for a merchant. To receive the payments and also for the customers as well.
So the complete journey. Complete journey, that's correct. How do you approach innovation while, uh, I mean operating under, uh, strict regulatory frameworks, especially with real time settlement, I mean, and data access at the core of your platform. That's the reason for open banking license. So you have to be a certified technology to do that.
And so that's the whole, the open banking promotes a real time settlement. So you have to be, you have to have right kind of technology, secure technology follow each and every framework set by the regulator, right? Implement that framework, that cybersecurity measures inside the technology to make it successful.
Let me ask you, what, what's your long term vision for how platforms like Payan can contribute to national. Uh, development goals like financial inclusion, [00:05:00] economic resilience, uh, the, the long-term plan is to see financial inclusion is all about how we can scale the economy and can keep the, the data secure.
And it's a, it's a, it's not just one element, it's a mix of all elements. Like Right, like I said to you, this 14 billion didn't cost spent. For payment. That's how much we've paid. If we can reduce that cost by 10 billion so that the 10 billion goes into financial inclusion is a hundred percent adoption by open banking, 10 billion will go into financial inclusion and it cannot be done by just us.
Of course, we required all the fintechs to promote the this, and then we can all do it. Amazing. What should we expect from Pay10 over the next, uh, 12 to 18 months? I mean, as the digital payments, uh, landscape continues to evolve and with all what's going on around, we want competition. We want to make, we want to make sure that every small merchant has got access to instant settlement.
And cheaper payments. So for that, we have a plan in place which we are going to [00:06:00] target and serve the entire SMEs of this region. Go and then give them an alternate payment method. I want to know about you as a person, chairman, founder, and of course you have enjoyed the success journey. What is the advice you give to probably startups, people who wants to, who are in the same field?
From your personal experience, what brought you here at this position right now and what is your advice on different levels? Three important words, conviction, belief, and hard work. It's a combination of three where, where I've got today, where I have conviction is when you, you have to have conviction in your idea and you have to believe in you that your conviction will take place.
And the same time, you just have to keep trying. And hard work. And hard work. There is no, there is no road, which leads to. Rome and with a shortcut, right? You have to go through what you have to go through, but you, it's not a easy success. You have to be, you have to have conviction. You have to have, you have to try hard again, and again, and again and again.
And if you have the right idea and you have the right conviction and the zeal and energy to [00:07:00] do it, I mean, there's nobody who can stop you. Uh, and the support of God is what we require to make it happen. I love what you said. Allow me to ask you a final question. Tell us about the biggest challenge you have faced and how did you solve it?
The biggest challenge for our founder, it is, is only 24 hours in a day. Only, only 24 hours in a day, and the work is about 26, 27 hours, 28 hours, something 40, 48 hours. The biggest challenge is managing time. Managing time. So I have really focused on managing my time, how I can. Spend those 24 hours. If I from 24 hours, I have to sleep as well.
I have to take care of my health at the same time, because health is important in order to succeed, right? I have to take care of a business which requires 12 to 14 hours a day, and I have to be with family. So what are those things when you are on certain level in life, which you can eradicate those?
Those things, which by which I think, you know, you can save time and hire right kind of people for those work, which does not require executive decisions. Have the right team for those work, which doesn't require executive decisions so that you can [00:08:00] focus on decisions which will take the business one step further ahead.
So I think time management and your each and every second matters, how you spend that each, every second on making the right decision for the company or not wasting decisions. Thank you very much Mr. Rigel, founder and chairman of Payan. Thank you very much. One of the most exciting discussions I had today.
Thank you for being our guest at Date with Tech podcast. We would love to see you another time. Thank you. And thank you very much. And this is Sha Dawi, your host for today. Thank you very much. Thank you.