Mehmet Sezgin is the former director of Global Payment Systems at BBVA (Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria) and was the co-chairman of Garanti Payment Systems between 2012 and 2016.
In May 2016 he set up his own payments company myGini, Inc. in San Francisco California.
At BBVA he moved the card base from 67 million to 80 million while doubling the merchant POS base to 1.4 million which generated $115 billion purchase volume at 13 countries (Spain, Portugal, Turkey, Romania, USA, Mexico, Chile, Argentina, Peru, Uruguay, Paraguay, Colombia and Venezuela).
A firm believer in new technologies, he launched a global digital app called BBVAWallet. It was launched in Spain, Chile, Mexico, USA, Turkey and Colombia with downloads now reaching more than 20 million.
Before BBVA, Mehmet was the founder-CEO of Garanti Payment Systems, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Garanti Bank Turkey. Mehmet launched the first chip cards in 2000 and created a loyalty platform called bonus card which was licensed to 10 other banks. He was instrumental moving Turkey to full chip & pin EMV infrastructure in 2006.
Under his leadership, Garanti moved from 700 thousand cards and 25 thousand POS terminals to 20 million cards and to 600 thousand POS terminals while building the biggest e-commerce platform in Turkey. Garanti is now within the top 5 largest credit card issuers in Europe based on the purchase volume.
Before establishing Garanti Payment Systems, Mehmet opened the Eurasia Office of MasterCard Europe after working in several banks at different capacities. He started his career as a consultant at PricewaterhouseCoopers.
He had been a long time board member of MasterCard Europe and Interbank Card Association (BKM). Mehmet also served as the chairman of Credit Bureau in Turkey and was the chairman of Risk Centralization Platform at Bankers’ Association.
He holds an MBA from the University of Massachusetts which he earned with a Fulbright scholarship and Bachelor of Science in management from METU.
