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companies & people
6 Payments Visionaries
Nicole carroll
Vice President, New Products and Innovation, Discover
Nicole Carroll likes to push the limits of what’s possible. Inspired by the science fiction novels she swaps with her 12-year-old daughter,
Carroll constantly looks for ways to bring new con- sumer experiences to life.
“You can see so many technologies we never thought would happen in our lifetime. Google Glass is straight out of Star Trek,” says Carroll, who describes herself as an early adopter. While she doesn’t sport the fu- turistic eyewear yet, she lives by her Google Calendar. And, during her morning runs on Discover’s River- woods, Ill., campus—or in the gym during Chicago’s brutal winters—Carroll sports a Fitbit wristband to track her progress.
While Carroll relishes the idea that the seemingly unimaginable could be possible, she doesn’t ex-
pect significant disruption in the payments market. She believes the influx of payments startups will offer complementary services rather than disrupting established payments infrastructure. Prior to joining Discover just over a year ago, Carroll had a front-row seat to the startup frenzy, evaluating new entrants
vying for investment dollars from Citi’s venture capital arm. When determining which startups would have staying power— and, now, which ideas to pursue on Discov- er’s strategic road map—Carroll looks for security and technology that
work, along with consumer value.
“At Discover, we’re
looking at how to use our unique assets as a merchant acquirer and
network to bring value to consumers and our mer- chant partners.” For example, Carroll says delivering offers at the POS becomes a richer proposition when
you can authenticate a consumer and tailor the offer to him. “It’s more smart data versus big data,” she explains.
Although her first job after graduating from George- town University was managing a credit card program for Citibank, Carroll often has focused on taking payments into new territory. Case in point: She spent eight years in London, changing the way London commuters pay for transit fares. As a chief marketing officer at HP/EDS, Carroll led the successful launch of the Western Hemisphere’s first contactless smart card—the Oyster Card.
Carroll returned to the States to join Cubic, a San Diego-based tech company, where she looked to leverage transit cards as multi-application smart cards. She then returned to Citi as the managing director for Citi Ventures, were she developed the Citi transit business model and made venture in- vestments into emerging and disruptive startups.
Carroll joined Discover to create and lead the company’s global emerging payments product vision and road map, in collaboration with teams all across the organization. New technologies, chip-based and contactless capabilities, mobile opportunities, as well as prepaid and alternative payment products and programs are under
her purview.
What’s the biggest change Carroll’s witnessed in
her 20 years in financial services and technology?
It’s the recent support around EMV in the U.S. market, she says. “EMV creates a superhighway for NFC, because the majority of terminals being deployed
will have NFC capabilities.
“As a whole, the industry is diligently future-proofing the bells and whistles around payments to enhance security and create a customized mobile solution
for consumers,” she adds. “What excites me is bring- ing together offers, loyalty and geolocation in a seamless manner to benefit consumers, merchants and the network.”
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