Vodeno appoints payments industry experts Philip McHugh as Chairman and Noah Sharp as CEO

Vodeno, a leading European Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS) provider, today announces the appointment of Philip McHugh as Chairman and Noah Sharp as CEO. McHugh and Sharp will steer Vodeno’s next phase of growth and continue the company’s momentum, with more than 30 BaaS projects delivered or in development, and new investors, NatWest Group and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), confirmed in recent months.

Together, McHugh and Sharp have a combined 50 years of experience in the international banking and payments industry. McHugh is the former CEO of Paysafe, a global leader in specialised payments. Prior to Paysafe, he was the Senior Executive Vice President and President of TSYS Merchant Solutions. McHugh also spent 20 years working for two of the world’s leading banks, most recently as Chief Executive Officer of Barclaycard Business Solutions and a further 10 years at Citigroup, where he held several senior management roles within the credit card division.

Sharp joins Vodeno from UK FCA-regulated payments firm BCB Group, where he served as Deputy CEO. He is also the former Chief Banking Officer of Paysafe, responsible for global financial partnerships and operations across international, digital banking, card acquiring, e-money wallets and embedded finance. A career fintech banker and payments expert, Sharp has held several senior roles within global banks, including Standard Chartered Bank, where he was responsible for building and advising the Bank’s fintech client franchise in Europe and North America. Prior to this, Sharp worked at Deutsche Bank for 11 years across several continents, where he most recently led global relationships for European and US headquartered fintechs and other non-bank financial institutions.

Vodeno’s proprietary, cloud-native banking platform offers the ability to partner with any bank or payment institution to enable a comprehensive suite of embedded banking products. The company currently partners with ECB-licenced, Aion Bank, to offer B2B and B2C solutions to European e-commerce, fintech and corporate clients, as well as banks, and Vodeno recently announced a strategic partnership with NatWest Group to create a BaaS business in the UK. This partnership will enable UK businesses to embed financial products such as payments, deposits, point-of-sale credit and merchant cash advances directly in their ecosystem by leveraging Vodeno’s BaaS platform, and NatWest Group’s banking and clearing infrastructure, as well as its UK banking licenses.

As part of the NatWest Group deal, NatWest announced a EUR 58m investment in Vodeno Group. Additionally, EBRD announced an equity investment of up to EUR 50m in Vodeno Group. Vodeno Group is backed by global growth investor Warburg Pincus.

Wojciech Sobieraj, Founder and Board Member, Vodeno, said: “Philip and Noah bring deep payments, banking and financial services expertise to Vodeno. Their impressive track record of scaling businesses, alongside an intrinsic understanding of how to successfully support large-scale BaaS projects positions the company well for its next phase of growth. Our ability to attract Philip and Noah, alongside key investors Warburg Pincus, NatWest Group and EBRD, demonstrates the strong belief in our ability to become Europe’s leading BaaS provider.”

Philip McHugh, Chairman of the Board, Vodeno, added: “Wojciech and team have built an incredible business at Vodeno. The technology the team has built is second to none, and the client wins and partnerships created to date are truly impressive. Additionally, everyone – from the internal teams to the Board to the investors – is highly focused and energised on making Vodeno a major BaaS player. I look forward to building on the team’s great progress to date and working together to achieve Vodeno’s growth ambitions.”

Noah Sharp, CEO, Vodeno, said: “BaaS and embedded finance are not only changing the way people access banking and card products, but they are also creating an entirely new financial ecosystem for banks, fintech and e-commerce. Vodeno’s platform is unique; it can work with multiple partner banks across many countries and with companies across multiple sectors to enable a comprehensive suite of embedded banking, payments and lending products. I want to thank Helen Smith for her contributions as Interim CEO, and she leaves the company in a very strong position to scale. I am looking forward to working with Vodeno’s talented teams to establish us as the core, reliable BaaS provider in Europe.”