Synovus Bank has named Jonathan O’Connor as its chief third-party payments officer and CEO of Maast, effective Feb. 29, 2024. 

In his role, O’Connor will lead the bank’s third-party payments, including merchant services and sponsorships, to expand growth opportunities in the payments space. He also will lead Maast, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the bank, to further bolster banking-as-a-service and embedded finance solutions nationwide.

“As a well-respected global fintech leader, Jonathan brings dynamic expertise to Synovus to strengthen our payments business, and we’re excited he has joined us,” said Wayne Akins, Synovus’ chief community banking and wealth services officer. “Jonathan’s leadership will leverage our unique position in payments by driving strategic growth, expanding partnerships and solidifying our position as a reputable leader in this industry.”

O’Connor previously served as CEO advisor at Deluxe Corporation. He also acted as the U.S. CEO and Group CCO at Trust Payments, where he drove commercial change to deliver more than $6 billion in processing volume and 60% year-over-year revenue growth.

Before joining Trust Payments, O’Connor held several commercial leadership positions in First Data, now Fiserv, during his 13-year tenure. He was part of the initial public offering leadership team that raised $2.56 billion in 2015, established emerging market verticals in the U.S. and set up the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) e-commerce division and several bank-acquiring joint ventures, including First Merchant Data Services (U.K.), AIB Merchant Services (Ireland) and BNL Paribas (Italy). Before First Data, he was a founding member of the Elavon management team in 2004, holding the position of general manager, e-commerce EMEA.

O’Connor has a background in finance, information technology and commercial sales. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in accounting and finance and a post-graduate diploma and master’s in strategic management. O’Connor also served on the board of TeleCheck.