Steven M. Elefant, a point-of-sale payments expert with more than 29 years experience in start-up business ventures and electronic commerce, joined Heartland Payment Systems® in November 2008. Steve began as a consultant, helping Heartland bring its Software as a Service (SaaS) applications to its merchant base. In January 2009, he became the executive director of end-to-end encryption and in August, was named chief information officer (CIO).

As CIO, Steve is responsible for developing POS products and executing the company’s new E3™ security platform that encrypts cardholder data from the point of swipe/entry at a merchant location through the payments processing network and to the card brands. Steve manages a team of IT professionals and works closely with Heartland Chairman and CEO Robert O. Carr and the company’s strategic business partners.

Prior to Heartland, Steve was an entrepreneur, founding and managing successful businesses that operated in Silicon Valley and serviced countries around the world. His breadth of experience spans a wide spectrum including merchant and business services for online consumer auctions and application service provider (ASP) services for digital content and payments management. Steve is the co-founder and former CEO of ICVerify, Inc., a leader in payments processing integration of PC-based POS software.