The Green Sheet Online Edition
August 11, 2025 • 25:08:01
Trade Association News
Words of gratitude from Ken Musante
Ken Musante received the Midwest Acquirers Association's Lifetime Achievement Award at the organization's annual meeting held in Chicago on July 30 and 31, 2025. We are pleased to publish the speech he gave when accepting the award. Here are Ken's words:
Ya'all like my sweater? When certain people see me in this sweater, they know one of two things: I'm either a very gifted knitter—or somebody loves me. My wife is with me today. She makes me better. She is my witness and I am hers. If you see her at the bar, say something nice about me. ... and she'll buy you a drink.
When Rod called me that spring morning, I was with a long-time client, eMerchant. Rod and I speak from time to time about various topics, and I assumed this call was no different. I returned his call at the end of the day. I was dumbstruck when he shared the reason for his call. I couldn't wipe the smile off my face.
I am truly honored to be at this podium. The acknowledgement of the people in this room humbles and inspires me.
If you are a past MWAA award recipient, thank you for being here. I reached out to each of you because you embody the reason this award holds such honor. Your accomplishments give this award meaning and context. To the Board of the MWAA, I am humbled, and I will carry this honor with me for as long as memory serves. Past award winners, including those here today— Fadi Cheikha, Jim Oberman, Bob Jenisch, Mark Dunn, Juan Ortiz, O.B. Rawls and Deana Rich—and I appreciate you.
As for what brought me here, nothing I've accomplished has been done in isolation. I've been in payments for over three and a half decades. Like many of you, I started at the ground level. My first job after college was at Wells Fargo's issuing center in Concord, California. The recruiter hired me because they said I was "tenacious." At the time, I didn't even know what the word meant. I later learned that when you don't have an interview but still put on a suit and sit outside the interview room until someone speaks with you—that's tenacity.
Wells Fargo was a great place to start, but I sensed there was more. ... In 1993, Ted Mason, CEO of Humboldt Bank, hired me to start the bank's merchant services program. For 10 years, I had the chance to work with exceptional individuals who challenged me and made me better. We took pride in what we built. I met Tim Miller, Chuck Burtzeloff, Tim Jochner and Joe Kaplan in my early days. Each of them was formative in my career.
It was during those days that I became friends with Deana Rich and Susan Horne, as we each led sponsor bank programs. I value their friendship to this day.
When the bank sold the merchant services division in 2003, I had the opportunity to continue leading Humboldt Merchant Services, this time as a standalone company and as part of a bank holding company—thanks to the Lamb family, whom I met through Pacific Coast Banking School. To those who were with me during the Humboldt years, I hope you learned as much from me as I did from you.
For 15 years at Humboldt, I was often the youngest person in the room. Times have changed, but I strive to continually learn. Those years gave us a foundation to thrive in payments. Today, the Western States Acquirers Association is led by Humboldt alumni: Deborah Camm, the outgoing president, and Scott Defazio, the incoming. Before them, Pat Ford and X. Ayala, also Humboldt Alums, served as President.
Hilda Tuel, Linda Straub, Jamie Savant, Scott Bartlett, Steve Kimberling, Matt Dreise, X. Ayala, Scott DeFazio and Deborah Camm all went on to found additional payments companies. That is a legacy I'm proud to be a part of. Amanda Beam went on to work at Humboldt longer than I worked there.
In 2008, our owner bank failed—SVB, I see you. We navigated through and were acquired by Moneris. Watching the company I helped build become part of something new was difficult. But I worked for Greg Cohen and did my best to integrate Humboldt into Moneris. We eventually sold the name and part of the business to Marc Gardener, and I'm pleased that the Humboldt name lives on. One of my close friends, Joe Garza, came into my life through Moneris.
In 2010, the weekend before I left Moneris, I told my then 12-year-old daughter of my plans to join longtime friends Steve Kimberling and Scott Bartlett and start Eureka Payments. She looked me dead in the eye and said with only the total honesty of a 12 year old, "Daddy, what's your back-up plan?" It was only then that I realized I played a part in her upbringing. Eureka Payments is a direct-to-merchant ISO. We served Northern California, Southern Oregon and card-not-present merchants nationwide. I am honored to have worked with Steve and Scott for nearly a decade.
Being an independent ISO allowed me to write freely, unconstrained by the obligations of a public company. Writing required me to think deeply, and I thank The Green Sheet, Kate Gillespie and Laura McHale-Holland for the privilege and platform they provided.
While with Eureka Payments, Eugene Rome of Rome LLP encouraged me to serve as an expert witness. I hesitated, but he persisted, and I'm grateful he did. Today, expert testimony is one of my consulting verticals, and it's given me court-side seats to some of the most fascinating stories in the history of payments.
I've testified in both civil and criminal cases. I've been on both sides of a deposition with Ed Marshall. And I worked one of the most bizarre cases ever for Theo Monroe. It's amazing how hard some people will work to make a dishonest dollar.
In 2019, I left Humboldt County. My son needed services not available there. During our time at Eureka, we recognized the potential of payfacs, which became my next direction.
Patrick Guindon gave me the chance to serve as a product manager for WePay, a Chase-owned payfac. Before WePay, I'd had 10 bosses in my entire career. At WePay, I had at least as many in two and a half years. It was a challenge to adjust to a big company, but I grew tremendously.
I served as a scrum master helping integrate WePay's CNP ecosystem into Chase's CP solution. We failed—fantastically—but I learned more than from any success. Many of my current clients, like Coris.AI's founders Vinodh and Shaym, come from those connections, and I reach out to my WePay Alum regularly.
In 2021, I founded Napa Payments and Consulting. To Greg Reymundo, my first client, and Bill Dumont, my longest client, Thank you! Naim Hamdor, a close friend and Payzli founder, provided a unique opportunity to support them through their launch.
I still remember my high school commencement address. The speaker spoke about Kaizen, the Japanese principle of continuous improvement. I didn't fully understand it then, but it stuck. Kaizen, the idea of incremental progress, is something I strive for in my life. In 2017, I gave the commencement speech at my own son's graduation.
Though he didn't graduate in the traditional sense, I'll leave you with the message I shared and my own aspirations:
Regardless of your beginnings, where you are now, or what success you attain, measure yourself not against others—but by the distance between your aptitude and your altitude. Do that sincerely and with earnestness, and you will be amongst the richest people on earth. And we, who came to witness your journey, will be proud to have done so.
Thank you all. Thank you MWAA. It is a privilege to have my name forever etched in your organization's history.
Editorial Note: You can also tune in to an interview Allen Kopelman, CEO of Nationwide Payment Systems and host of the B2B Vault podcast, recorded with Ken Musante shortly before the award ceremony at B2B Vault, http://bit.ly/47bkkYs; YouTube, http://bit.ly/4ldnfmK; and Spotify, http://bit.ly/45hfEO7.
As founder of Humboldt Merchant Services, co-founder of Eureka Payments, and a former executive for such payments innovators as WePay, a division of JPMorgan Chase, Ken Musante has experience in all aspects of successful ISO building. He currently provides consulting services and expert witness testimony as founder of Napa Payments and Consulting, www.napapaymentsandconsulting.com. Contact him at kenm@napapaymentsandconsulting.com, 707-601-7656 or www.linkedin.com/in/ken-musante-us.
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