Scaling AI for high-stakes, real-time payments | Prasad Wangikar | StaffPlus New York 2025

Prasad Wangikar discusses how Stripe uses AI to enhance payment processing, focusing on making payments safer, faster, and more efficient. He highlights AI's role in optimizing the checkout experience, minimizing unnecessary authentication challenges, and providing fraud protection through Radar, which has reduced dispute rates for Stripe users by 17% despite an industry-wide increase in fraud. Wangikar addresses key challenges such as maintaining data quality, measuring the impact of AI models, and ensuring system reliability. He introduces the "clarity framework" (what, why, who, how, and when) for decision-making and emphasizes collaboration, surgical precision in system evolution, and designing for endurance over mere speed.