Meet Gabi Malayev, Nuvei’s Senior Director of Observability

Ask Gabi what it takes to keep merchants running smoothly through Black Friday, and he’ll tell you:

“We make sure every transaction flows, every connection holds, and every system stays balanced.”

That kind of calm doesn’t come from random chance. It comes from an infrastructure built for scale and a team that never stops looking ahead. Gabi and his team design and run the observability systems that power Nuvei’s global payments platform. Think of it as a control tower for billions of transactions, all monitored and optimized in real time.

How observability works at Nuvei

Observability means knowing how every part of your system is performing and being ready for whatever comes next.

Inside the observability framework:

• ‍Unified telemetry and tracing. Every transaction sends a signal across the network and API layers, giving the team a live view of the entire system. ‍
• Predictive analytics. Machine learning spots traffic surges or latency before they happen. We scale instantly, keeping performance steady. ‍
• Human insight where it counts. Gabi’s team constantly tests, tunes, and improves. It’s how we keep raising the bar.

As Gabi says,

“With every service we build, observability starts in the design. It’s about embedding reliability from the very beginning, not responding once the system is live.”

The result? Consistent performance, steady authorization rates, and peace of mind when volumes soar.

When things get unpredictable

Even high-performing systems depend on external partners. During peak periods like Black Friday, performance issues can start outside your environment, such as with downstream issuers or third-party integrations, and still affect your business.

That’s when observability earns its name. The system detects irregularities in real time and adapts instantly. Traffic gets rerouted, workloads shift, and the payments keep moving.

Gabi puts it simply:

“Incidents can happen anywhere. What matters is that the merchant stays online and the customer experience doesn’t skip a beat.”

The team’s goal is simple: keep transactions flowing while our teams quietly solve what’s happening behind the scenes. For merchants and shoppers, it’s business as usual, and that’s exactly how it should feel.

Partnership in action

Ahead of a major global launch, one of the world’s top video game publishers partnered with Gabi and his team to prepare. Together, they forecasted demand, modeled pre-sale traffic, and optimized routing to ensure seamless performance.

When the game went live, millions of purchases were processed within hours. No downtime. No disruptions. Just fast, secure payments and satisfied players. Post-launch analytics then helped fine-tune the next release for even better results.

This is what real partnership looks like: proactive planning, real-time precision, and measurable business outcomes.

Gabi’s advice for retailers gearing up for peak season

"If there’s one thing we’ve learned," says Gabi, "it’s that preparation always pays off."

1. ‍Start early. Forecast volumes, run load tests, and review your payment flows before traffic spikes. Nuvei is here to help with all of it. ‍
2. Communicate. If you expect a big surge, give your payment partner a heads-up. The more we align, the smoother the experience for your customers. ‍
3. Learn from the data. After peak season, analyze what worked best. Approval ratios, transaction paths, and performance insights are gold mines for optimization.

As Gabi puts it,

“You can’t predict every spike, but you can be ready for any scenario. The right partner helps you turn uncertainty into opportunity.”

The moments that matter

Black Friday. Cyber Monday. A global product drop. These aren’t pressure moments for Gabi’s team — they’re planned moments.

The moments that matter.