Merchant Payments Ecosystem

Merchant Payments Ecosystem (MPE) is the principal European event focused specifically on the merchant side of the payments value chain — acquirers, payment service providers, gateways, and the merchants who consume their services. It sits alongside CardForum, MoneyLIVE Payments Europe and EuroShop as calendar anchors for the same audiences.

What happens

The programme combines plenary sessions on the major shifts in European acquiring and merchant payments with parallel tracks on card-present and card-not-present innovation, B2B payments, cross-border acquiring, fraud and risk management, the strategic evolution of payment service providers, and emerging payment methods. The exhibition floor is concentrated on the supply side of merchant payments — acquirers, processors, gateways, fraud and identity vendors, and the rapidly growing ecosystem of orchestration and value-added services serving the merchant payments stack. Awards programmes recognise excellence across the merchant payments value chain.

Who attends

The audience is unusually specialised: senior product and commercial leadership from European acquirers and payment service providers, gateway and orchestration platform executives, fraud and risk management leadership, senior merchant-side payment leadership from large European retailers and e-commerce operators, and a substantial vendor presence from the broader merchant payments ecosystem. International visitors come from US, Middle Eastern and Asian payment companies actively engaged in European merchant payments.

Dominant themes

The European merchant payments agenda emphasises the strategic and operational priorities of the acquiring and merchant payments industry: the practical mechanics of card-not-present authorisation rate optimisation through network tokenisation including Visa Token Service and Mastercard Digital Enablement Service, Click to Pay rollout across European markets, the integration of Apple Pay, Google Pay and other digital wallets, the rapidly evolving landscape of payment orchestration, the role of stablecoins and account-to-account payments in B2B settlement, the regulatory environment under PSD3 and the Payment Services Regulation, fraud prevention under tightening regulatory expectations, and the strategic positioning of European acquirers against consolidating global processors.

Planning to attend

Berlin is well-connected by air and hotel supply is plentiful at competitive pricing relative to other major European conference cities. The conference language is English. The merchant payments community is unusually tight-knit; informal networking time is consistently rated among the highest-value parts of the conference. International visitors should plan around Berlin's substantial cultural attractions, which support productive informal networking between sessions. Many attendees combine the trip with adjacent commercial meetings in Berlin or other German fintech hubs.

Use the expense calculator below to estimate the total cost of attending — registration, flights, hotels, meals, and ground transport.