Director, Enterprise Payments Strategy & Partnerships

What You'll Do

• Enterprise Payments Coordination
• Serve as the enterprise-level point of coordination for payments across Fanatics Commerce, Fanatics Collectibles, and Fanatics Betting & Gaming, ensuring strategic alignment and eliminating duplicative or conflicting vendor relationships
• Monitor pricing and economics across all processing, gateway, fraud, and wallet/checkout solutions, identifying opportunities for consolidation and cost optimization
• Define and track enterprise payments KPIs including authorization rates, cost of acceptance, fraud rates, and customer experience metrics
• Partner with operating company payments leads to align on shared infrastructure, routing logic, and vendor strategy
• Translate enterprise payments strategy into clear internal requirements and execution plans that operating teams can act on
• Payments Partnerships & Commercial Negotiations
• Lead identification, evaluation, and negotiation of strategic partnerships with payment processors, acquiring banks, card networks, digital wallets, orchestration platforms, and fintech companies
• Own end-to-end deal processes including RFPs, commercial term negotiations, contract execution, and post-launch performance management
• Develop and present business cases for new partnerships, including financial modeling, customer value analysis, and operational feasibility assessments
• Build and maintain senior-level relationships with key payments partners to ensure Fanatics captures favorable economics and access to emerging capabilities
• Stay current on industry trends, network rule changes, emerging payment methods, and the competitive landscape to keep Fanatics positioned as a payments innovator
• Business Development Operations
• Manage pipeline tracking, deal support, pitch development, and launch coordination
• Oversee the enterprise payments partnerships pipeline across loyalty integrations, financial services, and alternative payment methods — including opportunity tracking, stage gating, and prioritization
• Ensure effective project management for new partnership launches, coordinating across Product, Legal, Finance, Risk, Loyalty, Marketing, and operating companies
• Support ongoing partner management post-launch, including executive cadence, performance reviews, and issue escalation

What We're Looking For

• 10–14 years of progressive experience in payments, fintech, business development, or e-commerce, with at least 3 years in a leadership role
• Demonstrated experience negotiating and closing strategic deals with payment processors, card networks, digital wallets, or fintech partners — both issuing and acquiring
• Strong understanding of the payments ecosystem including transaction flows, processor economics, fraud and risk tooling, orchestration, and alternative payment methods
• Proven ability to operate across a complex, multi-business-unit organization and drive alignment among diverse stakeholders
• Strong analytical and financial modeling skills; ability to build compelling, ROI-driven business cases
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to influence both internal executives and senior external partners
• Familiarity with loyalty ecosystems, financial services partnerships, or digital wallet integrations is a strong plus