Press & Media Kit — The Idle Billions | Giannetto & Ablowitz

Author Bios

David F. Giannetto

Co-author · Operating Partner · Former CEO, WorkWave

Short bio (50 words): David F. Giannetto is a private equity operating partner, keynote speaker, and former CEO of WorkWave and Netchex. He led one of North America's most ambitious embedded fintech transformations — processing invoicing on nearly $25 billion in transactions — and is the author of four books, including two with Wiley.

Long bio: David F. Giannetto is a private equity operating partner, CEO advisor, and former CEO of WorkWave, a global leader in field service and workforce management software, where he led one of the most ambitious embedded fintech transformations undertaken by any vertical SaaS company in North America — processing invoicing on nearly $25 billion in transactions and moving close to $10 billion across the company's own proprietary payment rails. Over 35 years he has built and transformed SaaS, fintech, and technology-enabled services businesses, growing WorkWave from $52 million to nearly $500 million in revenue in five years and later leading Netchex, a payroll and human capital management provider, as CEO. Today he serves as a non-executive director and operating advisor for Five Arrows (Rothschild & Co), Teleo Capital, and Roswell Growth Capital. A former U.S. Army officer with the 10th Mountain Division, he holds an MBA from Rutgers University, where he taught in the Executive MBA program. The Idle Billions is his fourth book and his second with Wiley.

Todd M. Ablowitz

Co-author · Co-founder & CEO, Infinicept

Short bio (40 words): Todd M. Ablowitz is a payments industry veteran and co-founder and CEO of Infinicept, the infrastructure utility that has helped launch hundreds of payment facilitation businesses — including Stripe, Shopify, and Mindbody — processing more than $77 billion in payments since 2019.

Long bio: Todd M. Ablowitz is a payments industry veteran and co-founder and CEO of Infinicept, an infrastructure utility that has helped launch hundreds of payment facilitation businesses, including Stripe, Shopify, and Mindbody. Since 2019, Infinicept has safely processed more than $77 billion in payments and onboarded over 600,000 merchant applications for clients including NCR, PAR Technology, PNC, KeyBank, and FTD. He is one of the payments industry's most recognized voices on payment facilitation and embedded finance.

Ten questions to start with

What do Warren Buffett's 1967 insurance play, a 1924 Chicago train robbery, and the Starbucks app have in common?
You say every company sits on money it doesn't know it controls. Where is it hiding?
What is the "Proximity Principle," and why should the company closest to the customer own the financial relationship?
Starbucks holds roughly $2 billion in stored balances. Is that a loyalty program or a bank?
What's the difference between "synthetic money" and float — and why does it matter for a CEO?
You built embedded payments into industries that had never seen them. What's the biggest internal obstacle companies face?
What is the "Loyalty Bank," and how can consumers tell when a company is making withdrawals from it?
Your "Fintech Tenets" confront an ethical tension — the same mechanics that build trust can exploit it. Where's the line?
How should investors tell real embedded fintech from a feature built for a pitch deck?
Where does fintech go next — and who wins: the banks, the platforms, or someone else entirely?

Everything you need to cover the book

Photos & materials

David F. Giannetto

Todd M. Ablowitz

David Giannetto — Speaker Kit

David F. Giannetto

Todd M. Ablowitz

Ten questions to start with

Interviews, review copies & bookings