 Hi everyone, it's really great to be here with you all today both in the room as well as online I know I'm the last thing before lunch, so I promise I won't go late But to get started a quick intro about me. I joined American Express in 2013 I started on our AmEx offers team, which is our card linked offers program I then moved to the digital payments team where I've been for a few years Currently leading our emerging payments team and I've worked on a range of Payment products from digital wallets commerce qr peer-to-peer and others So today really excited to be talking to you about how we think about innovation at American Express How we're set up to be able to do this effectively and then walk through an example of this in action So when you think about innovation the first thing that comes to mind might not be a big company You might be thinking start-up fintech But what we found is that innovation inside a big company is essential It's necessary to keep evolving adapting growing staying relevant to your customer base Innovation inside a big company is also easier because you have all of these additional resources that are available to you to tap into and And innovation inside a big company is everywhere. It's not just happening in a single pocket But it's happening throughout the entire organization And so for American Express innovation is a rich part of our history Founded in 1850. We started as a freight forwarding company very different than the type of work that we do today But from there we moved into the travelers checks business before moving into the credit card business Which we since expanded globally More recent examples of innovation you see from the team come in the form of the destination airport lounges like the Centurion Lounge Our recent co-brand card with Delta where the cards made out of pieces of a retired airplane Our expansion into banking as well as our AI powered chat servicing within both our mobile and our web channels and Many other examples including the one that we'll walk through today And so one of the ways that we're able to create some precision around this agenda of innovation Is through a group called AmEx digital labs? So labs was formed to focus on the short to medium term adjacent Opportunities to be able to deliver new products and services to both our existing customers as well as net new customers And so there's a couple things I want to highlight there. The first is the short to medium term So we're not looking too far into the future, but rather what do we think is going to be relevant today and in the next couple years? Adjacent opportunities, we're not looking too far afield, but what do we think is still going to resonate with our customer base? And when I say customer, I mean this really broadly we're an enterprise team So we're thinking about all of the customers that AmEx serves So those are our card members whether they're consumers small business owners corporate card members our merchant partners as well as our network partners And so one of the ways that we're able to do this effectively is the way that we're structured So we sit within an organization called enterprise innovation partners, which is made up of three teams So this includes labs as well as strategic partnerships Which manages the relationships with our largest partners at American Express and then corporate development which includes AmEx ventures AmEx ventures is our venture portfolio where we invest in startups and then corporate development manages any mergers in acquisition activity And so by sitting within the same group We're able to partner very closely together and keep a pulse on what's happening outside of American Express So what's going on in the startup community? What's the new emerging technology? What's top of mind for our partners and that allows us to be able to quickly identify new opportunities to pursue and move forward? The other thing I want to highlight here is we are truly an enterprise team So we're not sitting separate. We're embedded into the business Regularly engaging with people across the company to understand what are both the challenges and opportunities that we can prioritize and pursue And so taking this outside in perspective. We have six key areas of focus payments commerce membership blockchain and web 3 AI and next-gen servicing and then a little bit of a catch-all bucket at the end called R&D slash disruptive tech And so I'm not going to go through everything on the slide and this certainly isn't exhaustive But gives you a sense of some of the things we currently have live in market like our digital wallets as well as some of the areas That we're currently exploring like the future of work The other thing I want to highlight on this page is this concept of graduation So labs is a relatively small team less than a hundred people and there's benefit to staying nimble So once a product reaches a certain level of scale We look to graduate that product to another part of the business for that team to then carry it forward Which frees up the labs team to then kind of focus on what's next? Good example of this is the consumer checking product that we launched last year So this is something where the labs team helped to build out the checking functionality But then once the product launched we fully graduated it to the consumer banking Organization that had recently been stood up and that team has continued to carry that product forward iterate and scale it and So when we think about success we have four key metrics that we're looking at both yearly and over time So the first is around revenue growth So we have a specific target that we're aiming for And we're looking at both direct as well as indirect revenue that our products are contributing to the organization We have new products launched So we have a specific target that we're aiming for each year usually between 20 25 new products or pilots that we want to get live and Then customer engagement slash satisfaction So this is to make sure that we're building products that can reach a large number of customers We're not just designing for a niche sub-segment and that when our customers are using our products They're finding value and they're engaging with them on a regular basis And then lastly we have speed to market So we're always looking for ways to be able to cut down on the amount of time it takes to get something live And so the teams made up of three different types of roles So you have product management, which I'm part of this team is responsible for managing our current portfolio of products As well as all new product development Partnering very closely with engineering design marketing as well as other product teams across the organization Then we have product enablement this team is responsible for partnering closely with our stakeholders to identify any risks Make sure we have the right controls in place and then taking the products through any necessary approvals processes And then lastly we have business development So the business development team is responsible for identifying any new market or partner opportunities Managing those partner relationships any contracting and then helping to drive the go-to-market strategy And so each roles requires different set of skills We have a very united approach when it comes to sourcing the best talent So we're focused on bringing together a group of talented diverse individuals Who have a growth mindset? They put the customer at the center of everything they do They're adept with tech and ultimately they have this curiosity They want to know how things work and they get excited about building new products and bringing them to life And I think this is truly what makes labs and AmEx special is its people So when we think about innovation We take a very methodical approach Leveraging the formula you see on this page So it's not just this like aha light bulb moment where we're coming up with new ideas But rather a very intentional process that we're following and so start first by identifying the emerging trend or customer sentiment This allows us to understand the urgency in which we need to take action as well as how is it relevant to our customers? Second is defining the customer problem to solve and how we can uniquely solve it and Then tying this into the business strategy. So how does this help us meet core business objectives? And at that point you then have an elegant solution with a sound hypothesis that you can go out and test that your classic product management work But then you're able to leverage the scale that comes with a large organization So tapping into your internal infrastructure and existing partner network Identifying colleagues who believe in the mission stakeholders who are ready to go on the ride with you teams who can connect you to partners and Then you're able to leverage the customer reach and existing marketing engine that you already have to let your customers know about this new product That's available Knowing that you've already earned the permission to be able to trial and test new concepts with them because they trust in your core product And then lastly taking advantage of the gift of time that a large company affords So being able to get something into market gather feedback Iterate let the pilot breathe and at that point you're then leveraging all that a multinational Organization has to offer to be able to effectively innovate and deliver something really impactful So we'll go through an example of this the example I have is virtual card number, which is something we launched in partnership with Google earlier this year So virtual card numbers are not new they've been around for a while But what we're doing here is we're making them available within Google Chrome for the first time and So the emerging trend at the time is in 2021 e-commerce share of global retail Sales was over 20% and that number is only expected to grow So customers are increasingly shopping online and they're going to continue to do so and when they're shopping online They want it to be easy and they want it to be secure They don't necessarily want to be digging around looking for their card having to type in all their details And from an annex perspective we want our customers using their annex card when they're shopping We want to be able to capture that e-commerce spend and so when we were thinking about what we should do about this It made a ton of sense for us to partner with Google on their virtual card number initiative People shop across Google more than a billion times each day That's massive scale and so for us to be able to partner together with them Building upon our existing relationship that we have through Google pay We're able to bring virtual card numbers to our card numbers within Google Chrome And here we really took advantage of the gift of time when it came to rolling this out So we started small we made it available to 0.5 percent of customers and we just left it there And we wanted to see how is it performing? Was it working as expected did something come up that we didn't catch in testing? Was there any feedback and then we were able to address any of those issues before rolling out to more customers? And so then we gradually started to roll out over the course of several months before finally going to full availability in March of this year so the way this works is You are shopping within Google Chrome You recently completed a purchase at that point Chrome is going to ask do you want to save your card to your Google account? So this is the standard autofill experience if any of you have gone through this today And at this point your card is now saved to your Google account so that you can use it the next time you're checking out online But now you'll also have the option to be able to enroll in a virtual card number So at this point you now have your card saved to your Google account. You're enrolled in a virtual card number The next time you come back I'll play the video shortly But once you get to the point of checking out and you're at this final page You go to click into the credit card field. What will happen is the autofill drop-down will appear You'll be able to see both your physical card as well as your virtual card to select if you select the virtual card What happens is a real-time call is being made to AmEx to retrieve those card details And then the card details are being auto populated into those checkout fields So as a customer you don't need to enter anything so I'll play this quickly so you can see how it works So click in drop down select the virtual card and now your details are populated So from a customer perspective is really simple You don't have to enter anything and then the other advantage here is that what's being returned is not your actual card number Instead, it's a token. So a token is essentially an alias card number And comes with that added layer of security of not needing to share your actual card details with the merchant when you go to complete that transaction So we just launched in March So still early when it comes to being able to report out results But some of the initial things that we're seeing is that we have 50% faster checkout when compared to manually entering in your card details So this is really streamlining the experience for customers and hopefully ultimately driving additional purchases The most popular merchants by spend are in the travel industry So seeing a lot from hotel bookings as well as airlines And this is definitely a function of the time of year But we saw a lot in Q1 in the form of purchases for tax services And I think this is actually a really great use case for virtual card number You're not filing your taxes on a daily basis. Thank goodness But it's something that you need to do and so you're not necessarily going to have your card saved on file With the tax service provider you're using but it's an important transaction And so now you can reach for that virtual card number to be able to easily check out and feel secure when doing so And so still all your days a lot more that we need to do when it comes to Seeing how this is performing iterating evolving the product some of the things we're going to be looking at is how is this helping to drive Additional conversion so ideally additional purchases more spend How is this impacting fraud rates and we'll continue to track that and see how this scales over time And so in summary key drivers of our success when it comes to innovating within a large company The first is having leadership and stakeholders who believe in and invest in innovation So this is something we have with with labs the way that we're structured our CEO Steve squary used to lead our tech organization He gets it Great talent who believe in the mission. So like I said before this I think is truly what makes America Express special is its people Innovating just at the boundary to make progress without breaking trust. So again, those adjacent opportunities And we've established a track record of piloting with some successes that are now ready to scale across the enterprise And that's ultimately allowed us to leverage the power of enterprise back in And so that's all that I have today. Thank you very much really appreciate it