WorldRemit appointed Breon Corcoran, the former CEO of bookmaker Paddy Power Betfair, as its new chief executive charged with driving the company’s ambitious global expansion plan.

The company, which delivers half of its international money transfers to mobile money accounts, has set a goal of increasing its customer base to 10 million by 2020 from 3.5 million currently.

Corcoran replaces company founder Ismail Ahmed, who takes the role of executive chairman. In his former role, Corcoran oversaw the merger of digital betting exchange company Betfair with high street bookmaker Paddy Power.

In a statement, Ahmed said the new CEO’s global outlook and experience in a consumer-facing business would enable WorldRemit “to realise our ambitions to find new ways to help customers do more with their money as the company scales.”

Corcoran added: “Across the world, consumers are turning away from cash towards digital payments solutions. With tailwinds like the global adoption of new technologies combined with growing remittance flows, there is enormous potential for WorldRemit’s global expansion and I look forward to leading the company through its next evolution.”

Since its formation in 2010, WorldRemit has built a global fund transfer network able to send money from 50 countries to 150 destinations, primarily in developing markets.

Over the last 12 months the company has worked on boosting its scope and number of destinations by striking a number of deals with operators, MVNOs and banks.

As a result of the scale of its partner network, the company is able to deliver funds to 130 million mobile money users across the world.