« We'll finally start to see the movement around mobile payments. We've been waiting for this magical moment to take place. » Pamela Joseph, head of payment services division at U.S. Bancorp
About Joseph: Pamela Joseph leads one of U.S. Bank's most dynamic divisions. Payments is a key growth engine for the bank, covering credit, debit and prepaid cards; card processing for merchants, and the Minneapolis-based bank's investment in mobile payments. Joseph has presided over major acquisitions and international expansion of its card processing operations since 2004.
Personal file: A native of Chicago, Joseph lives in the Atlanta suburb of Roswell with her husband, Hank, and three sons. She heads the nonprofit Women Leaders in Action, which supports women's education in Africa, and travels there frequently.
What's big in 2014: Joseph sees the long-awaited breakthrough in mobile payments, although she's not sure what exactly it will look like. "We've worked on pilots with just about every kind of handset, every piece of software." The bank is focused on point-of-sale technology to help merchants accept smartphones as payment. Micro location technology allows retailers to tell what aisle of the store you're in, for instance, and zap you a coupon on the spot. The bank is doing a beta launch of a media app called "Peri" that allows companies to encode media so people can quickly scan an item, click and buy it from their mobile device.
Final word: "It's total impulse buying. Now you can turn advertising into action."
JENNIFER BJORHUS