“Security is a community sport” “Solve security as a science and engineering problem. technical problem. Communicate about security as business problem." A prolific inventor and cyber security & digital identity business-enabler executive with an “art of possible” mindset who led global teams to secure world class organizations and held executive and senior leadership positions at American Express, Visa, PayPal and is credited with 95+patents. Upendra is the Chief Security Officer of Snap Finance, a leading omnichannel digital-first fintech and POS lender, where he leads cyber security while building new platforms to enable growth opportunities. This includes securing innovative multi-cloud platforms and products, Artificial Intelligence, client-facing technology, and customer and developer experiences. Accomplishments: > Led digital transformation of security for American Express > Designed creative business solutions with Amazon and other integrations > Led cybersecurity of Visa Checkout, Google Pay, and Apple Pay at Visa > Pioneered security safeguards for PayPal > Led identity transformation initiatives at PayPal and Amex > Led securing hybrid cloud. He is a regular speaker at esteemed conferences for Stanford University, Global Big Data Conference, NFC forums, European Identity Conference, KNOW Identity Conference, Global Retail Conference in Canada, IOT conference and others. Featured in Genius Journal, he helped pioneer blockchain in Amex and filed patents on blockchain and DLTs. He and his team worked on IOT security and payments and participated in several industry standard bodies like EMV, Global Platform, PCI-DSS, FIDO, etc. He is an advisory board director for select security startups and helps venture capitalists evaluate companies. He holds an MBA from Santa Clara University, California, and a Bachelor of Engineering in Computer Science from VNIT, Nagpur, India. He is credited with 95+ patents issued and pending and has received awards for innovation and leadership.