With innovation at its heart, Euro Asia Pay delivers customized payment solutions for customers globally

In the digital world we live in, it is very crucial to prioritize innovations in payments as the area of focus because they serve the future needs of people. The ongoing pandemic has boosted the need for innovation, and it has also altered the demand patterns. Businesses are also noticing the shift in consumer behavior, and they are on the lookout for new solutions to meet the ever-growing demands. Businesses working in different verticals have met their immediate needs and are now looking ahead to innovate and provide the best customer experience. The way people are handling payments has changed dramatically. Consumers are now more into smartphones, connected devices, and other digital media to pay and get paid.

Globally various companies are providing excellent innovative solutions for the payments segment, but Euro Asia Pay Holdings stands out from the rest. Incorporated in British Columbia in October 2017, EURO ASIA PAY HOLDINGS INC. (EAP) specializes in developing innovative financial solutions for the next generation of consumers. The company’s cutting-edge products provide seamless and secure payment services to users around the world.

In conversation with Peter MacKay, CEO of Euro Asia Pay

Q. Explain your services in brief.

The SideKick Card is the perfect financial product, which is powered by Mastercard and includes a feature-rich platform. SideKick is a turnkey solution that allows parents to send, monitor, and control funds for their children. The product also offers added financial control for parents so that they can control where their kids spend their money, as well as monitor transactions and balances. With our unique feature of international money transfers, international students do not need to have an existing bank account in Canada and can access their funds instantly once they are deposited onto the Sidekick Card, which they can then use anywhere a prepaid Mastercard is accepted, in-store or online. Additionally, they have access to budgeting tools and resources to help them manage money and gain financial literacy.

Q. Clients view data security as among the top challenges in payments today. How does your company outplay fraudsters?

EAP has built a solid feature-rich financial services platform that ensures data security and delivers a fully transparent financial solution. The platform includes controls to provide users with a variety of security functions. These controls are customized to fit a program’s requirements and include (but are not limited to): locking and unlocking a card for use, receiving real-time notifications of important account activity, replacing a lost or stolen card with limited account interruption, and distribution of funds specific to user-created rules, among other functions. SideKick cards are powered by Mastercard, which has approved our program in conjunction with Peoples Trust, a leading issuer of prepaid and credit payment cards. Peoples Trust is recognized as a pioneer and innovator of prepaid cards in Canada. In addition, SideKick adheres to strict financial regulations, as dictated by FINTRAC (Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada).

Q. Where do you think the modern digital payment platforms lack behind? How is EURO ASIA PAY filling the void?

Modern digital payments often provide general services or look at more significant demographics without understanding that each group has particular needs. For example, a fair currency exchange rate would rank higher on the list of priorities for international students than it would for other users. With EAP, we looked at the international student market and delivered a product specifically for them and their digital financial transaction needs while getting settled in Canada. Another example is the domestic youth market. We’ve heard from kids, teenagers, and their parents how they feel underserved by traditional banks and other financial institutions, as these companies tend to focus their efforts on the active population. There is a lack of solutions exclusively thought of for the financial literacy of kids and teens. Other solutions can be used by youth but were not developed with their needs in mind. That’s where we fill the void: we listen to their needs, and we evolve our products and services to support them every step of the way. We see the need for budgeting and daily financial transactions on an alternative-to-banking platform increasing day by day, and our technology addresses much broader audience needs and demands.

Q. Do you have any new services launching soon?

SideKick will be available Canada-wide in Fall 2021. As a Canadian company with an established presence worldwide, we need to lead in our domestic market. Having previously been aimed only at international students within Canada, SideKick will now support Canadian parents and their children, increasing the addressable consumer base from approximately 700,000 people to more than 6 million. We also have plans to extend and duplicate our products and services to other countries in the near future, as most of them face similar problems in terms of kids’ and teenagers’ financial literacy.

Q. What does the future hold for your company and its customers? Are exciting things on the way?

We continue to add features that SideKick users can enjoy. Just in May of this year, we launched the new SideKick Mastercard with advanced features. It allows students to enjoy other functionalities that were not part of the previous version of SideKick, such as contactless payments (tap), secured payments with chip and pin, as well as ATM withdrawals. We also had a tech integration with Cohort Go, adding 187 new countries to the Sidekick platform for a total of 241 supported countries in total. We will continue to innovate and look at segments and previously overlooked demographic groups to ensure that their needs are closely met when rolling out new products.

Meet the leader behind the success of Euro Asia Pay

Peter MacKay is the CEO of Euro Asia Pay. He is a senior business leader with international experience in both private and public companies. His expertise spans 25 years with a track record of building and growing successful technology businesses and two successful exits and three public listings. He founded Expert Agent in 2003, the leading real estate SaaS solution in the United Kingdom, connecting more than 14,000 realtors and almost 9 million home buyers. Prior to joining EAP, Peter acted as the President, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Operating Officer of Venzee Technologies Inc, the Managing Director at Websky Ltd. (Expert Agent), and the Chief Operating Officer at PDT Technologies Inc., a global, full-service product design and development firm which is now called Kabuni Ltd. and is traded on the Australian Stock Exchange.

Alongside with EAP, Peter also volunteers his time and experience with The Royal Canadian Marine Search & Rescue (RCM-SAR), where they provide marine SAR response 24 hours a day, 365 days a year on the British Columbia coast. Peter commented “It feels good to give back, and pulls on my almost decade long career in the military”. Peter holds a MBA degree from the Beedie School of Business at Simon Fraser University, a diploma in Business Management from Salisbury College and a BTEC in Computer Science from Boston College (UK).

“Our SideKick branded product enables parents to control and monitor payments to their children in a simple, intuitive manner."