VII INTERNATIONAL BANKING FORUM

After graduating from the secondary school he was admitted to the department of “Accounting” at Azerbaijan State Economic University and completed the full course on the speciality of “Economist” in 1981. Zakir Nuriyev started his labour activity as Leading Accountant at the “Control and Inspection” department of the Ministry of Communications, Azerbaijan Republic in 1981.

 Zakir Nuriyev did his military service during 1981-1983. He worked in the capacity of Accountant – Inspector, Chief Inspector and Deputy Chief Accountant at the “Control and Inspection” department of the Ministry of Communications, Azerbaijan Republic from July, 1983 until January, 1989 after having served in the military.

 He was appointed to the post of Manager of the “Control and Accounting” division at “Regional Communication” Production Association of the Ministry of Communications, Azerbaijan Republic in 1989. Zakir Nuriyev worked in the capacity of Chairman of the Management Board at “Rabitabank” Joint-Stock Commercial Bank during 1993-1998 and has been acting as Chairman of the Supervisory Board at “Rabitabank” Open Joint-Stock Company since 1998 up to date. He was elected President of the Azerbaijan Banks Association in 1996 and worked in that capacity until 2006. He has been member of the Presidium at Azerbaijan Banks Association from 2006 till 2015. He was re-elected President of Azerbaijan Banks Association in 2015.

Graduated from Ankara University, Faculty of Political Sciences, and Department of Public Administration. In 1996, Çakar started to work as an Assistant Auditor in our Bank, served as Auditor and Department Manager and was appointed as Regional Director-in-chief in 2005.

Çakar, became the Head of Department in September 2007, served as Executive Vice President for Retail Banking, Executive Vice President for Operations, Executive Vice President for Consumer Banking and Executive Vice President for Retail Banking, he served as Executive Vice President for Distribution Channels Management between January 2016-July 2017, Executive Vice President for Payment Systems between July 2017-June 2018, Executive Vice President for Retail Banking-2 between June 2018-March 2021.

He served as member of the Board of Directors/member of the Audit Board of Ziraat Leasing, Bileşim Alternatif Dağıtım Kanalları Ödeme Sistemi A.Ş., Ziraat Life & Pension, Ziraat Insurance, Credit Registry Bureau, Ziraat Bank (Moscow) JSC, Turkmen Turkish Joint Stock Commercial Bank, Ziraat Technology, Interbank Card Center, Ziraat Gayrimenkul Yatırım Ortaklığı A.Ş. (Ziraat REIT), Ziraat Bank (Moscow) JSC, respectively, between the years of 2003-2019.

Çakar has been serving as the CEO and member of Board of Ziraat Bank since March 2021. He is the Chairman of the Credit Committee since March 2021. He has been the Chairman of The Banks Association of Türkiye since April 2021. He is member to the Board of Türkiye Wealth Fund since May, 2021. He has been carrying out the duty as Chairman of the Board of Directors of Ziraat Participation Bank since February 2022.

Born on April 7, 1975, in Imishli region of Azerbaijan Republic.

Education:

In 1992 he was admitted to the Azerbaijan State Economic University with the largest score and graduated from high school in 1997 and received his second higher education in the Journalism profession of the Georgian Institute of Public Relations in 2004. In 2009, he defended his PhD in economics and in 2017 he defended his doctorate in economics.

Prof. Dr. Vusal Gasimli was awarded a certificate of completion for the "Leading Economic Growth" Program, [February-May/2021], John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, Executive Education.

In 2022-2023 Vusal Gasimli completed the University of Oxford's Postgraduate Diploma (PGDip) in Strategy and Innovation.

In 2013 Vusal Gasimli was given the title of associate professor.

V.Gasimli was engaged in pedagogical activity in the UNEC Special Talented Group and MBA program in 2010-2014.

V.Gasimli read public lectures at Washington University, California University, Cairo University, Warsaw University, Seoul Hanyany and Hankuk University, and Rio de Janeiro University.

Vusal Gasimli got the award of Astana Economic Forum for outstanding research achievements in 2012.

Worked as a guest scientist at Korea International Economic Policy Institute in 2013.

He has 10 books and about 500 scientific and publicist articles in Azerbaijani, Russian, Korean and English.

Vusal Gasimli is professor at the Azerbaijan Public Administration Academy under the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan since 2021.

Labor Activity:

During the 12.05.2000-06.12.2003, the economic consultant in Express newspaper edition,

15.02.2005-19.11.2005, Economic Reviewer at ANS-PRESS Publishing House LLC,

19.11.2005-30.04.2007, President of ANS-PRESS Publishing House LLC,

09.02.2009-11.05.2011, Deputy of head of the Department at Azerbaijan-Public-Political University,

In 2007-2011, he worked on projects implemented by the European Union, the World Bank, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and several international organizations.

In 2011-2016, he worked as Head of the Department for Economic Analysis and Globalization of the Center for Strategic Studies under the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan.

In 2015, he represented Azerbaijan at the T20 platform of brain centers of the G20.

From 10.05.2016 to present he is the executive director of theCenter for Analysis of Economic Reforms and Communication of the Republic of Azerbaijan.

He was awarded the Progress Medal in 2018.

Vusal Gasimli was appointed Focal Point of UNESCAP in 2021.

Married, has three children.

Mr. Osmanov has about 20 years of experience in information technologies, implementing a number of digital transformation initiatives in banking sector. During his professional career, Mr. Osmanov focused on both adoption of information and payment systems, covering ever-changing business needs and business process optimization to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of business process management. Nowadays, his main strategic focus is to establish cashless economy and accelerate the creation of a digital ecosystem in Azerbaijan.

Mr. Osmanov holds MSc on information systems and management; and certified as ITSM expert, practitioner in project management and ISO/IEC 27001 information security standard implementer.

After graduating from the Mechanical Engineering Department at Istanbul’s Bogazici University, the new Mastercard Turkiye and Azerbaijan General Manager Avshar Gurdal, received an MBA degree from the Koc University. He has been working at Mastercard since 2015.

Gurdal took the first steps of his career at the Unilever company and further worked at the PRG and Value Partners companies until his joining Mastercard Advisors in 2015. In 2016, Gurdal was appointed the Customer Relations Director at the company and was promoted to the Mastercard Turkey Vice-President role in 2019. With his new position, Gurdal is now responsible for conducting market management policies of Mastercard in Turkiye and Azerbaijan.

Graduated from the Business and Technology Management Institute of the Belarusian State University with a degree in finance.

He has more than 10 years of experience in IT and finance. Dzmitry helps banks around the world develop their digital channels to build a better customer experience. Сurrently holds the position of Executive Director.

Namig Aliyev was born in 1977 in Baku. He is a graduate of Baku State University. During his student years, he worked on a number of periodical publications. In 1999-2000 he worked in the Republican Scientific and Technical Library and in 2001-2003 in the Main Department of Cultural Education of the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Azerbaijan as a leading specialist. As of 2004, he worked as a correspondent, leading correspondent, assistant editor, editor at the Free Azerbaijan Broadcasting Company "Azad Azərbaycan".

He started working in the Communication Department of the Central Bank of the Republic of Azerbaijan in May 2010. Since July 2011, he has been the Head of the Public Relations Division of aforementioned department. He is the presenter of "Economic News" program  at Azerbaijan Television and Radio Broadcasting Closed Joint-Stock Company (AZTV).

Kirill Ovsiannikov is a technology communicator, banktech expert and marketer with 10 years’ experience. Since 2017 he has been responsible for building and performing a promotional strategy for BS/2 software products for banking and retail. Kirill’s extensive media background helps him to popularize innovations and explain sophisticated IT things in layman’s terms.

Guliev Farid Fuad was born in Baku in 1986. He is an economist. He started his professional career in 2007 in the finance industry and from 2012 he held a position in board of directors of different financial organizations.

Since February 2018 he is appointed to the post of Head director of “Azəricard” LLC.

Over 10 years of experience in information technologies, from software development to managing IT projects in the financial sector.

Project manager of the Blockchain-based platform in Azerbaijan, aiming to implement Digital Identification System in order to develop trusted, secured and transparent banking services for individuals and legal entities. Responsible for developing a strategy for introducing innovative solutions in the financial sector and plan to introduce new initiatives.

Teymur Aghakishiyev is a Deputy Chief Executive Officer at “Expressbank”. He has 16 years of experience in banking sector and has enjoyed many executive positions throughout his career in product development and management, product sales, strategy, digital payments, payments and cards infrastructure, treasury, settlements and cash management.

He loves to dig into customer problems and solve them with modern technology and puts the customer at the center of all that he do.

Teymur Aghakishiyev holds MBA degree in Banking from Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation.

He is a professional trainer in banking.

Mr. Ramil Mahmudov is a Chief of the National payment system development division at Central Bank of Azerbaijan Republic. He is responsible for development of cashless payments in Azerbaijan and for regulating its activities in accordance with the legislation. He is an experienced professional in payment systems, electronic banking, mobile banking, card business, e-money, e-payments and retail banking. As an co-author of several regulations and recommendations for banks and other stakeholders, he also familiar with regulations, recommendations and experience of ECB, EU, CIS, BIS about payments systems ecosystem and payment instruments and also with risk management, fraud management, chargeback procedures of Visa and Master Card.

Mr. Mahmudov holds Master’s degree in Banking and Finance from Luxembourg School of Finance, University of Luxembourg and Master’s degree in Finance from Azerbaijan State Economic University. He received Certificate on “Management Development Program” from Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy in 2014 and Executive education Certificate from New York University Stern School of Business in 2015. He received a numerous training certificates in the field of cashless payments and management in Europe and Asia.

Doctorate of the Economic Reforms Research Institute under the the Ministry of Economy of the Republic of Azerbaijan Rustamov Tamerlan has worked in the field of development and control of payment systems at the Central Bank of the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Financial Market Supervisory Authority in different years.

Currently, he is Deputy Director of Payment Systems Department of Bank of Baku OJSC. He is also the head of the Expert Group on Payment Systems and Digital Banking at the Azerbaijan Banks Association, and the project manager at the Azerbaijan Fintex Association.

During these years of career, he was closely involved in the formation of the digital payment ecosystem in the country, the creation of a regulatory legal framework in this area, the application of innovative payment tools and technologies.

He is the co-author of the "Digital Payments and Electronic Banking Services" textbook, published for the first time in the field of digital payments in the country. He is the author of more than 10 scientific articles and many publicist articles in the field of digital transformation and digital payments.

For the period of 2006 – 2013 he has been working as Senior IT Auditor and Head IT Audit division at Central Bank of Azerbaijan Republic. From 2013 to 2017 he worked for Group of Companies as Head of Management Assurance and Director of Information Security divisions. From 2017 to 2021 Ilgar held CIO position for Port of Baku. Now he is founder and CEO of BISA LLC (Business Information Security Assurance). Currently he is Deputy Chair of ABA IT and Information Security Committee. He supervised and implemented number of audits and consulting projects for Central and Commercial Banks, telecommunication, energy, and manufacturing companies. Ilgar has wide experience on Digital transformation, information security design and implementation, internal control system and cyber-security improvement, operational risk management and assessment. He is member of International ISACA association since 2007. Member of PECB as international certified trainer since 2018.

Vusal Khalilov has more than 15 years of experience in IT and digitalization. He graduated from the Faculty of Applied Mathematics of Baku State University with a master's degree, and morever he has the Organizational Change Management (OCM) certificate of the Oracle company. Above that Vusal Khalilov has got the MBA program from ADA University. He is a professional who implements the latest technological solutions and new approaches to improve business results.

Vusal Khalilov led strategic functions such as creation of products and services and digital engineering department at Azercell Telecom and PASHA Bank. Currently, he is working as the General director of Technologies Unit of PASHA Bank.

Elvin Shahverdiyev is Head of Information and cyber security division at the Central Bank of the Republic of Azerbaijan. Mr. Shahverdiyev has over 15 years of experience working in Information Technology and Information Security. He conducts the creation of an information security management system at the Central Bank and manages in accordance with advanced standards and information security policies.

Competencies: Strategic Thinking, Security and Privacy Management, Technical Competencies.

Edgar Abdullayev is EMBA Graduate of Yeidtepe University of Turkey.

He has 14 years of experience in Managing people. His corporate life has been divided in to different periods as 11 years of Telecommunications, 2 years of Transportation and travel, 4 years of Banking and Financial Technologies. During his corporate life periods in Telecommunications and Banking, Edgar has been a part of very important and decision-making teams which affected directly customer experience in financial transactions, financial technologies and banking experience.

Right now, he is Managing Director of United Payment LLC and adding value to the “Digital Payment Strategy” of country.

Simon has spent his career within innovative technologies, including working with blockchain and financial technologies in Australia, the US, UK, Asia, and Europe. Most recently leading the Digital Assets Programme at the University of Cambridge, and as Co-Founder of middle office startup MOOPS Tech. He holds an MBA from AGSM.

Born in Trabzon, Turkey on 1981, graduate of Istanbul University Business Management Faculty and has a 17 years experience on Financial Institutions. After working more than 11 years in Finansbank, Murat K. has shifted his career path towards fin-techs. Currently, Murat K. is acting as Head of International Partnerships and Executive Vice President of Turkey’s first licensed money transfer company – UPT Ödeme Hizmetleri ve Elektronik Para A.Ş. Murat K. is managing partnerships with more than 142 companies globally and running Operations in 12 network countries where UPT brand is actively conducting business directly.

An experienced professional in AML (anti-money laundering) and Fraud Monitoring sector. Extensive knowledge and experience in Analytics Solutions, watch list filtering, customer onboarding, risk assessment, transaction monitoring, KYC and due diligence, respectively. Have been actively involved in implementation of AML and fraud monitoring solutions and has been giving consultancy to Tier-1 large banks in Turkey and Azerbaijan.

Born in 1985, married with a daughter is the Head of Growth and Analytics Solutions in DVA Bilişim ve Yazılım A.S since 2012.