MasterCard appoints co-presidents

MasterCard has announced the appointment of two co-presidents -- Ling Hai and Ari Sarker -- for the Asia-Pacific region, the company said yesterday.

The creations of two sub-regions -- Northeast Asia and Australasia and Southeast Asia and South Asia -- were also announced, according to the statement.

The new sub-regions have been recognised as part of the growing importance of Asia-Pacific as a whole which houses two of the region's biggest markets such as China and India. Ling Hai will be the president of Northeast Asia and Australasia region. Recently, he served as group executive of enterprise development, international markets for MasterCard.

Hai joined MasterCard in 2010 as division president of Greater China and brings 22 years of experience in areas including financial services and consulting. Sarker will be the president for the Southeast Asia and South Asia region.

Sarker has been with MasterCard for over four years and has recently worked as MasterCard's division president for South Asia and country corporate officer, India.

He has over 22 years of experience spanning the finance, commercial, and M&A sectors in key markets in the Americas, Europe and Asia Pacific.

Both Hai and Sarker will be based in Singapore.