Cards Technical Implementation Lead

Job Summary

This role involves leading the technical implementation and productionisation of card programs including consumer credit, wallet-linked prepaid, and commercial cards in the KSA market. The position works closely with client technology and product teams to manage the end-to-end delivery of card launches under a principal membership model.

Responsibilities

• Lead the full technical delivery lifecycle for consumer credit, wallet-linked, and commercial card programs, ensuring on-time milestone delivery of at least 90%.
• Coordinate principal membership enablement including ICA assignment, membership documentation, and regulatory submissions to SAMA, achieving operational membership within 8 weeks.
• Manage card productionisation and digital issuance processes, integrating with NI processing platform personalization bureau as per scheme requirements.
• Execute digital wallet and tokenisation launches (Apple Pay, Google Pay, xPay) including MDES setup, tokenisation deployment, 3DS authentication, and provisioning flow validation.
• Lead scheme certification and quality assurance activities such as MIP testing, parametrisation, SIT/UAT, performance, and security testing, resolving all P1/P2 defects before go-live.
• Manage authorisation, authentication, and dispute management configurations to ensure operational readiness post-launch including incident management and handover documentation.
• Coordinate among Processor, personalization bureaus, and client teams through workshops, design sessions, and governance meetings.
• Ensure card programs are launch-ready with BIN setup and scheme certification within the first 3 months and maintain weekly status reporting and monthly SteerCo cadence.

Must haves

• Hands-on end-to-end technical implementation experience across consumer and commercial card programs (credit and wallet/prepaid).
• Direct experience with principal membership setup and ICA enablement with a major card scheme.
• Processor integration experience with tier-1 issuer processors.
• Knowledge of SAMA regulatory framework for card issuance and consumer finance licensing.
• Fluent English and availability immediately or within 30 days.
• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Engineering, or related field.

Nice to haves

• 10+ years in payments technology, card issuing/processing, and technical implementation program management.
• Experience delivering card product launches across multiple markets, ideally GCC/MENA.
• Familiarity with card management systems like PowerCARD, Way4, VisionPLUS, Cortex, Prime.
• Knowledge of ISO 8583 / ISO 20022, tokenisation (MDES/VTS), 3DS, PCI-DSS compliance, API integrations, and cloud-native architectures.

What the company offers

• Competitive salary and benefits.
• Opportunity to grow career in a fast-paced startup.
• Ownership of initiatives and specific responsibilities.
• Continuous coaching and mentoring with senior data scientists and AI experts globally.
• Dynamic and respectful work environment.

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