For many around the world, Visa is just a logo on a card. In Egypt, it is to ‘non-cash payment’ as Kleenex is to the word “tissue.” Go to pay in just about any shop, and you’re not asked “Cash or card?” but “Cash or Visa?” That’s the kind of brand dominance marketers dream of, and it’s been built over nearly 70 years of being the invisible rails for consumer payments.

Visa is the biggest player in a messy global war over the future of payments. And every fintech founder and her brother on a “mission” to “revolutionize” the very definition of money (for the betterment of the “ecosystem,” of course), the plastic in your wallet is no longer the central actor — electrons are.

The war for the future of payments is unfolding on three fronts: First, there are the sovereigns: Governments, particularly in emerging markets, are building their own payment rails. Saudi Arabia has Mada, and Egypt has Meeza and the InstaPay network. They all look at India’s UPI with envy, eager to control their own financial destiny, boost inclusion, and, yes, have a say on the fees. UPI, launched just nine years ago, processes even more real-time payments (640 mn a day) than does Visa (639 mn).

Next, there’s the infrastructure front: The massive, clunky, and wildly inefficient worlds of business-to-business (B2B) payments and cross-border remittances — still largely reliant on slow, expensive networks like SWIFT — are the next big frontier.

And third, the “sci-fi” front — the stuff of which OpenAI’s Sam Altman and his buddies dream. The rails themselves are being challenged by stablecoins promising 24/7 settlement and agentic commerce, a future where the robot does it all for you: Your AI assistant books and pays for your holiday in one seamless, embedded transaction.

How does the 800-pound gorilla of the old map plan to win this new war? We sat down with Tareq Muhmood, Visa’s new regional president for Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East, and Africa (CEMEA), to find out. In one of his first interviews since taking on the role, Muhmood laid out a vision for “Visa as a platform” — a company that has “unbundled” its decades of tech to offer clients everything from risk and anti-fraud services to core infrastructure, even for its new government-backed competitors. Joining us for the wide-ranging conversation were Leila Serhan, senior vice president and group country manager for North Africa, Levant, and Pakistan, and Malak El Baba, who runs Visa’s business in Egypt.

Edited excerpts from our conversation:

ACT I: WHAT’S CEMEA, REALLY?

ENTERPRISE: You’ve lived and worked in 13 countries. You’re now running CEMEA, which strikes me as three very different territories: Central Europe, the Gulf, and Africa. How do you run a region that diverse?

TAREQ MUHMOOD (TM): It’s a great question. I find there are a lot more similarities than differences. People want convenience, they want speed, they want transparency, whether you’re a merchant or a consumer. That really shapes our strategy.

At the same time, the execution is always very local. We have amazing people that sit on the ground. We just opened an office in Tanzania, for example, because we recognize that the payments ecosystem in that country needs more regular, intense connections. We’re opening an office in Kuwait with 12 people.

And here in Egypt, we were just talking about the size of our team. It’s grown from 15 people a few years ago to over 105 now. That’s not going to go down anytime soon.

LEILA SERHAN (LS): One of the really interesting things we’ve done at Visa is build what we call “market archetypes.” We look across the world and ask, ‘Which markets behave alike?' For example, the UK might have more in common with Australia than with Poland — and in the same way, Egypt has a lot in common with parts of Southeast Asia.

That lens helps us decide what to prioritize in each place. In Egypt and similar markets, it’s about building — creating relevant solutions for every segment, from large banks to the smallest sellers. And you’d be surprised by how agile many of these markets are — in some cases, even more agile than the “advanced” economies.

ENTERPRISE: Tareq, what’s one thing an outsider would be surprised by across your territory?

TM: Especially for someone coming from Europe or North America, it’s how mobile wallets are amazingly exciting and how they’re having an impact. We were in Kenya last week, and you see how that’s become very much a part of the ecosystem. I was in Ivory Coast not long ago, and those mobile operators have done a phenomenal job in complementing their telco networks by offering financial capability as well.

WHAT IS VISA, ANYWAY?

ENTERPRISE: To understand how you’re tackling the new battlegrounds, we need to understand what Visa is today. For readers who only know the logo, how does Visa actually make money?

TM: It’s by facilitating payments, essentially, and then surrounding that with the right capabilities to make sure that payment is transparent, secure, and you can use the data to provide better payment experiences. It’s a stack of technology services we provide to clients who want to use it to provide their clients with a great experience.

ENTERPRISE: I won’t say we’re clinging to our bills, but Egypt is still a society in which cash is quite central. How does that inform strategy for you? We can’t be the only market that’s like this…

TM:I still remember when travelers checks were a thing… Look, I think it’s about the evolution of what I think of as the “customer experience of payments,” which is evolving incredibly rapidly. If someone left the planet in the early 1990s and came back now? They wouldn’t recognize it: Contactless payments. E-commerce. Now agentic commerce is just getting off the ground.

ENTERPRISE: You talk about Visa as a “network of networks”. What does that mean in practice?

TM: I’ll give you a real example. If you went to China five years ago, you would struggle to pay with a card outside the normal hotels or restaurants because WeChat and Alipay QR were dominant.

Over the last two or three years, we’ve gone live where, in the WeChat or Alipay app, you can actually insert your Visa credential. You put in your Visa card details, and now you can use the Visa credential through the Alipay app or through WeChat to pay at any location you want around China.

Being a “network of networks” is about accepting that we’re not going to be at every potential location, but we’re that network of networks that can connect to make sure every single merchant can be connected to every single consumer.

ENTERPRISE: So what are the big drivers of the business for you? You’re not just selling cards anymore.

TM: It’s really across three main areas. One is the journey of creating efficient and beautiful payment experiences. This is our core. It includes expanding contactless payments onto transit systems or improving tokenization to make e-commerce smoother and more secure.

The second growth driver is managing risk. As e-commerce grows, and as many countries launch real-time payment — or RTP — systems, along with that comes fraud. We see a rise in fraud, whether it’s fake links or other scams, so we’re really adapting our risk solutions to not only protect Visa payments, but to also protect all types of payments. Clients have been adopting our technology for different purposes than what we imagined years ago.

The final one, which excites me, is agility. Many of our clients are really struggling with their technology stacks. Because of compliance requirements, or because they need to innovate really quickly. We had a client that wanted to launch a new proposition. If they used their own in-house technology, it would have taken two years to build. By leveraging what we bought and built as Visa, they were able to go live in three or four months.

ENTERPRISE: This is the new thesis, then. It’s not just a card network — it’s a modular tech company.

TM: Exactly. What’s really exciting is that Visa has evolved. The stack of our technology that’s been built over 60 years has been unbundled. Depending on what your needs are — whether it’s risk, or infrastructure, or processing for Visa or non-Visa payments — there are different modules that you can pick and choose from our stack. It’s Visa as a platform.

THE NEW BATTLEGROUNDS

ENTERPRISE: Let’s talk about those new battlegrounds. You have governments in this region launching their own payment schemes, like Mada in Saudi and Meeza in Egypt. They’re encroaching on your space. They look at UPI in India and think, “Hmm… we want some of that.” How do you work with sovereigns in cases like this?

TM: I’ve been on a journey with this. My mindset is, I’m thrilled. I’m thrilled that every country has an agenda to drive digital payments. The more digital payments there are, the more transparency and inclusion there is.

There are two approaches. One is, we can help. We do actually help in some countries where they need risk advice or cybersecurity advice, because every payment system is vulnerable. At the same time, we’ll continue to focus on building the network Visa’s been building for more than 65 years. I think it should be welcomed that local digital payment systems exist.

LS: You’ve mentioned Meeza here in Egypt and Instapay. It is actually benefiting our business as well, because it’s opening up opportunities for more financial inclusion and digitization. There are a lot of discussions we’re having with the central bank and other regulators on how we can cooperate together, specifically on the risk part.

ENTERPRISE: Where is the most interesting white space for growth as government-backed companies get into the financial inclusion game?

TM: There is just an abundance of opportunity. I’ll give you two real examples. First, many banks around the region continue to use SWIFT as the primary way of sending money. I have two sons in Sydney. For me to send them money via SWIFT, it takes maybe four days. And if I send USD 700, they’ll receive USD 650 because of correspondent banking charges.

The other day, I was talking to my son on Snapchat, and he told me, “Dad, I need USD 700”. While I was speaking to him, I was able to open up my bank app and send him USD 700 on Visa Direct, on our rails. He received it within four seconds of me hitting ‘send.’ It’s from a bank account to another bank account, but using Visa’s rails. And there’s maybe a USD 3 charge for that payment, but he received exactly what I sent him. We’re going to see that become a very normal payment experience, even on a Sunday.

ENTERPRISE: And the second one?

TM: The second one that I find really exciting is that there are still huge inefficiencies in B2B payments. When companies pay each other, whether it’s supply chains or contractors … when a building contractor needs to pay the subcontractors, it’s a very clunky method. The digitization of that has a huge growth opportunity.

LS: I would double down on the remittances. We know how important they are for these economies. In my own country, Lebanon, 50% of the GDP is remittances. People sending money back home. And I think what we’ve done with Visa Direct and Visa Plus, sending money mobile-to-mobile, push-to-a-wallet, push-to-an-account … It is a game changer for these markets.

ENTERPRISE: So the white space is more B2B now than financial inclusion?

LS: There is so much financial inclusion to be done in these markets — financial inclusion is B2B and B2C. Don’t only think of individuals — think of the small-scale sellers. Whether it’s one person at home baking cookies or an artisan or a small shop, they’re hungry to get the right financial services.

TM: Many people think of this as a financing need, when it’s not. A lot of the need is just transactional — they just need to be able to pay their suppliers and receive money as fast as possible.

LS: And we’ve seen mobile operators getting into this. I know a mobile operator in Pakistan that disperses more than 100k loans a day at an average ticket of between USD 5 and USD 10. Because that’s exactly what these macro-nano merchants need — he needs to put in petrol, he needs to top-up his mobile data or whatever. The mobile operators have the data to do that, and they’re taking this risk.

THE FUTURE OF THE RAILS

ENTERPRISE: Let’s turn now to the future of the rails themselves. I asked about Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) and whether they’re a threat.

TM:I feel that conversation has almost moved on to stablecoins much more than CBDCs, and how stablecoins can facilitate a more efficient payment system. We’re heavily engaged.

[Editor’s note: While Muhmood is bullish on the potential of stablecoins, his optimism comes at a moment of deep regulatory friction. Just this week, Chinese authorities reportedly tapped the brakes on stablecoin plans from Ant Group and JD.com, highlighting the exact sovereign anxieties Visa will have to navigate.]

ENTERPRISE: Where will I really use a stablecoin? By definition, it’s pegged to the USD or another currency, so why am I going outside a bank to use a stablecoin instead of just paying by bank using fiat currency?

TM: You’ll see it in a lot of countries, mostly where foreign-exchange restrictions are impacting the ability to move money. It’s just a convenient method to allow people to send money to each other. The other use case is really where people need settlement seven days a week, so you don’t need the clearing houses to be open. Stablecoin gives you that transparency plus the ability to transact 24/7.

ENTERPRISE: Moving even deeper into the sci-fi stuff, we have agentic commerce…

TM: It reminds me of my first time opening up … what was the first browser?

ENTERPRISE: Netscape Navigator.

TM: Netscape Navigator. That first time it opened up and you start thinking, “Oh my God, what is this?” I feel agentic commerce is at that chapter or stage. Think about it: Right now, you search your holiday plans, and whichever AI is giving you recommendations of which hotels to stay at, that’s where the journey ends. The payment experience is still something you have to get out of that and go and do. Where the future is going is a completely embedded experience, but within parameters that you set, where you as a consumer feel safe and the merchant also feels safe.

ENTERPRISE But if I’m a boutique hotel, I want that direct relationship. I want the customer to come to my site, join my loyalty program. Won’t this disintermediate me?

TM: It will sometimes, but it’s similar to … you walk around a shopping mall in Singapore, and they still sell beautiful fountain pens in the digital age. That will still exist. I’m sure in 15 years, there’ll still be travel boutiques that create great experiences. But there’ll be a huge amount of commercial transactions happening through agentic commerce where the robot does the shopping as well.

ENTERPRISE: Agentic feels … early, I guess I would say.

TM:It is, but similar to the launch of the internet and payments there, it's also going to take a few chapters before agentic commerce is a beautiful experience. But that train's left the station, and we’ll play a big part there. All around the world, people want convenience, they want speed, they want transparency — whether they’re the merchant or the consumer.

ENTERPRISE: Okay, last question. I have a college-age daughter. What are you telling your kids to study?

TM:I’m trying to teach them how to keep learning, rather than what to learn. They’ve got to learn how to be adaptable. I think it’s got to be behavioral, rather than what to study. That’s where I go.