Chris Colson, Payments Expert at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta is a 25-year veteran of the payments and financial services industry. Previously, Chris served as Director of Alternative Payments at Fiserv. There he defined, lead, and managed the alternative payments program. In addition, he defined emerging payment strategies, identified, developed, and worked with colleges and universities, start-ups and partners to create joint products. He gained additional experience leading global payments innovation at companies such as Aflac, TSYS, Equifax, Bank One and Bank of America. Chris holds an MBA in International Finance and has been granted two patents, which five more currently pending. They range in subject matter from payments, digital credit cards and identity verification, to beacons and insurance. A forward-thinker and education enthusiast, Chris is a graduate of Georgia Tech’s Flashpoint program, an incubator for start-ups. He has been a featured speaker for research firms such as Gartner, a presenter for payments.com at Harvard University, a presenter at Bank Administrative Institute (BAI) and Front-end Innovation, and a presenter at Finovate in San Jose, London, and Singapore. He teaches a graduate class at University of North Georgia, Entrepreneurship in large corporates, and has been a guest lecturer at University of Georgia, Kennesaw State University, and Your University in York, England. He has authored several white papers on topics such as identity and mobile wallets. He also serves as an advisor to several start-ups and is a board member for BMore Learning.