Lara Balazs is Senior Vice President of North America Marketing at Visa Inc. In this role, she is responsible for managing all aspects of marketing in the United States and Canada for consumer and commercial products. Under Lara’s strategic leadership, the North America marketing organization is dedicated to maximizing business building opportunites for Visa and its clients through activation of Visa marketing platforms and strategic use of partnership assets including NFL and Olympics. Prior to this role, she led Global Innovation Marketing, launching digital electronic payment solutions such as Visa Checkout and Apple Pay in the United States. In her 9 years at Visa, she has held a variety of other positions including Head of Global Product Marketing, Strategy & Planning and US Core Consumer Marketing.

Prior to Visa, Ms. Balazs held global marketing leadership roles at companies such as Nike Inc., Gap Inc. and General Mills. As a consultant at Prophet Brand Strategy, she built successful brand strategies for a variety of companies across industries.

Balazs is a graduate of University of Washington where she earned a Bachelor of Arts in Pre-Law, graduating Magna Cum Laude with Phi Beta Kappa distinction. She has an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Business at Northwestern University.