CTO Interview: Mindset Shift Is ‘Vital’ to Future of Financial Services

Data management makes for a unified ecosystem that fosters collaboration, Stax Chief Technology Officer Mark Sundt writes in a new PYMNTS eBook, “The Innovation Mindset: How to Achieve It in 2025.”

At Stax, we are committed to fostering growth and innovation, not just for ourselves, but for our partners and merchants. Following two strategic acquisitions and the addition of several key experienced leaders, we’re evolving into a true end-to-end payments processor and partner. Central to this evolution is embracing a “yes, and …” mindset — focusing on collaboration to unlock greater value.

A core area of transformation is how we leverage the vast data resources at our disposal. Historically, we have not leveraged this tool in a way that can be shared with our independent software vendor (ISV) partners and potentially even their merchants. Now, we are moving to empower our ISV partners with actionable insights in real-time from our data ecosystem. This collaborative approach enables them to create innovative solutions that enhance their offerings while driving mutual growth.

To achieve this, we’ve prioritized master data management (MDM) as the foundation for innovation. By standardizing and consolidating our data, we’re creating a single source of truth — eliminating silos and ensuring consistent, reliable insights. This unified data ecosystem enables our partners and their customers to make better-informed decisions, unlocking opportunities for growth across the value chain.

Another transformative force is artificial intelligence (AI), which we are integrating to enhance efficiency and uncover hidden patterns in complex datasets. By adopting a “yes, and” approach with AI, we can:

Identify unexpected correlations, such as emerging customer behaviors or market trends, to refine technology and improve the partner experience.

Enhance predictive capabilities, allowing us and our partners to make smarter business decisions.

Deliver advanced analytics that empowers ISVs to build smarter applications and offer more valuable services.

These efforts are designed to not only drive technological innovation but also address the real needs of our partners and merchants. For example, in conversations with existing ISV partners, we discovered an opportunity around enabling our ISVs to offer miscellaneous billing services on behalf of their customers. We recognized the increasing demand for flexible billing solutions that cater to a wide range of their needs. By empowering our ISVs to handle one-time charges, custom invoices and other unique billing scenarios, we can significantly enhance their value proposition and strengthen their customer relationships. This initiative could unlock new revenue streams for our ISVs while streamlining billing processes for their customers, creating a win-win situation for all stakeholders.

As a company, asking “what if” is integral to our culture. It ensures we continually challenge assumptions and explore new ways to support our partners and customers. By following through on these questions, we’ve discovered new approaches to shared success — moving beyond a “no, because …” mindset to one that prioritizes possibilities.

In the payments and banking industry, embracing this mindset shift is vital. Technologies like AI, advanced data analytics and real-time processing are key to enabling it. But innovation isn’t just about adopting new tools; it’s about adopting a culture of curiosity, collaboration and execution. At Stax, we believe this approach drives not only our success but the success of those we serve.