Sends chief executive Alona Shevtsova lined up with senior banking and payments figures at the Middle East Banking Innovation Summit, where talk turned to digital wallets, instant payments and cross-border rails.
The 17th edition of the Middle East Banking Innovation Summit (MEBIS 2026) drew banking, fintech and technology chiefs to Jumeirah Emirates Towers in Dubai on 17 September. Alona Shevtsova, CEO of Sends, was among the specialists on stage, appearing in the panel session “Payment Innovation in Banking: Real Time, Cross Border and Wallet Driven Evolution,” which weighed up the forces remaking payments across the region.
Alona Shevtsova shared the platform with Hasan Jaber, Deputy CEO at Al Fardan Exchange and CEO of AlfaNow; Ananth Srivatsa, Executive Vice President at RAKBANK; Mohamed Hussein, Head of Banking Solutions Center of Excellence at BANK NXT; Kamran Khan, Executive Director, Product Innovation & Implementation (EMEA) at First Abu Dhabi Bank; Ashish Gupta, Head of Digital, Retail SME and Sales at BankDhofar; and Naveed Minhas, EMEA IPC Payments Leader at IBM.
Speakers set out where lenders are already banking measurable returns from instant settlement, how wallets and ever more joined-up digital finance ecosystems are resetting customer expectations, and what still has to change before cross-border transfers turn faster and leaner.
Interoperability surfaced as a central theme. With funds now travelling between platforms, currencies and jurisdictions in seconds, banks and fintechs must bolt legacy systems onto newer rails without sacrificing security, compliance or operational resilience.
“The future of payments will not be defined by a single technology or payment method. The real opportunity is in connecting the ecosystem around the customer. Real-time payments, wallets and cross-border infrastructure need to work together so that moving money becomes simpler for the user, while the technology, compliance and risk infrastructure behind that experience continues to evolve,” Sends CEO Alona Shevtsova told delegates.
The Dubai slot rounds off a busy run of international appearances for Alona Shevtsova during 2026. Earlier in the year she sat on expert panels at PAY360 in London, covering agentic AI applied to AML and KYC alongside the maturing of embedded finance, and took part in Riyadh sessions on blockchain, AI, risk and digital finance.
Her MEBIS appearance also points to Sends’ deepening involvement with the Middle East finance scene, as the region keeps funding instant payment infrastructure, digital banking and novel cross-border models for financial services.
MEBIS gathers C-suite bankers, technologists and innovators drawn from the wider Middle East. This year’s agenda spans digital banking, payments innovation and open banking, plus AI and intelligent automation, embedded finance, data strategy, cybersecurity and the coming generation of financial infrastructure.
About Sends
Sends is a UK-headquartered financial technology company supplying payment services to businesses and consumers trading in both home and overseas markets. Smartflow Payments Limited, which trades under the Sends brand, holds authorisation from the Financial Conduct Authority as an Electronic Money Institution.
