Financial Crime Fighter Napier Adds 2 Execs

Financial crime compliance technology specialist Napier announced Wednesday (May 18) that it has added two new hires to its growing team in North America.

According to a company news release, Napier has named Shana Leyva as its head of marketing and Danielle Labarbera as head of sales. The new hires follow the company’s appointment last year of Aidan Houlihan as head of Americas, in response to rising demand for artificial intelligence (AI)-enhanced FinCrime compliance solutions.

“We’re pleased to see how positively the US market has responded to our AI-enhanced solution for anti-money laundering and compliance,” said Houlihan. “With increasing regulatory pressures and astronomical fines for non-compliance, financial institutions have identified a need for advanced technology to support their compliance teams.”

Leyva has 17 years of experience in marketing and communications, with an emphasis on technology and artificial intelligence. Before joining Napier, she was the global marketing director for Silent Eight.

Labarbera has spent 14 years in the financial services and FinTech space, most recently at risk operations tech firm Feedzai, where she served as vice president of financial sales. She has also worked for DocuSign, Accenture and Goldman Sachs, the news release said.

See also: FRAML Payments Guide: FIs Need to Update Their Crime-Fighting Tactics

As we noted last month in the “FRAML Payments Guide,” a PYMNTS and Featurespace collaboration, cybercriminals are becoming increasingly sophisticated, even as financial institutions (FIs) cling to their old ways of dealing with risk.

Many of these FIs have the habit of keeping transaction data and risk analysis information in silos — for example, anti-money laundering practices are seen as a compliance issue while fraud is handled as a security breach.

FIs are also often hindered by outdated or inefficient tools that can’t pair accurate risk scores with legitimate consumer behaviors. These can put financial institutions and their customers at greater risk, especially as FIs grow. Another issue: staying compliant once compliance has been achieved.

“For neobanks and FinTechs, the FRAML approach allows an acceleration of innovation,” the guide says. “A lack of technical debt makes it easier to implement a modern, best practices approach based on the tactics and lessons learned from incumbent FIs.”