Meet the IXOPAY Team

Suzanne Rudnitzki is a highly experienced executive in the fintech and SaaS sectors, formerly serving as Chief Operating Officer and Chief People Officer at Smarsh, a global leader in financial compliance technology. There she led international teams across the US, UK, and India, while playing a central role in executing strategic mergers and acquisitions, and driving operational efficiency.

Brian Downs is the Chief Financial Officer at IXOPAY, bringing deep experience in scaling finance organizations from startup to public company status. Before joining IXOPAY, he served as CFO at CATALIS and spent over 17 years at Shift4 Payments, where he played a pivotal role in growing the company from near zero to over $1.5 billion in recurring revenue. As Senior Vice President of Finance & Treasury at Shift4, Brian led critical initiatives including PE sponsorship, M&A, and a successful IPO. At IXOPAY, he oversees the global finance function, including accounting, FP&A, treasury, and tax, guiding the company’s strategic growth and financial operations.

Jill Willard is the Chief Technology Officer at IXOPAY, bringing over 20 years of experience in leading global payment platforms. Before joining IXOPAY, she was CTO at Xplor Pay, where she spearheaded the development and global operation of six distinct payment platforms. She also held various leadership roles at Clearent, Savvis, and MasterCard. With her extensive background in software development and expertise in scaling global payment infrastructures, Jill drives innovation and strengthens IXOPAY’s advanced Payment Orchestration Platform, ensuring it meets the growing scalability, security, and reliability needs of enterprise clients.

Kelly Wenzel is the Chief Customer Officer at IXOPAY, bringing over 20 years of experience in leading customer success and marketing initiatives within the technology sector. Before joining IXOPAY, she served as the Chief Customer Officer at SecureAuth Corporation, where she was pivotal in transforming the customer experience and fostering a customer-centric culture. Kelly has also held a senior leadership role at Cornerstone OnDemand, developing strategies that significantly enhanced customer engagement and satisfaction. At IXOPAY, she is responsible for overseeing the entire customer journey, ensuring that customers achieve maximum value from our solutions while driving loyalty and retention.

George Hansen is a seasoned payments and fintech executive with over two decades of global leadership experience. Known for his results-driven approach and deep expertise in digital payments, he has held senior roles at major industry players, including American Express, PayPal, and ConnexPay. Hansen specializes in driving revenue growth, organizational transformation, and customer-centric innovation. As IXOPAY’s Chief Revenue Officer, he leads global sales, partnerships, marketing alignment, and customer success, helping enterprise merchants adopt scalable, intelligent, and vendor-neutral payment infrastructure. His strategic vision supports IXOPAY’s mission to advance payments orchestration, secure tokenization, compliance, and AI-driven decisioning in the era of agentic commerce.

Peter Papaioannou is the Chief Product Officer at IXOPAY, bringing over 20 years of experience leading fintech and commerce platforms at scale. Before joining IXOPAY, he served as VP of Product at Everyware, where he spearheaded product vision and grew annual recurring revenue by 4X. He also held senior leadership roles at Global Payments and Visa, where he managed global product strategies and scaled B2B SaaS analytics platforms. With deep expertise in launching 0-to-1 solutions, embedded payments, and AI-driven tools, Peter drives IXOPAY’s product transformation, focusing on customer adoption and delivering high-impact outcomes in the evolving landscape of agentic commerce.

John Noltensmeyer is a privacy and data security professional with nearly 30 years of experience in information technology. He holds multiple certifications and maintains extensive knowledge of international privacy regulations and industry security standards. Prior to joining TokenEx, John worked in both the financial services sector and federal government, including technical lead roles at the International Trade Administration and United States Department of Commerce.