Former Stripe exec wants to stay strong beyond huge growth

Vidit Agrawal, co-founder of Indonesia-based startup GajiGesa, knows that crazy growth is great. But the staying power is excellent.

“Everyone is talking about profitability these days and I hope it continues. Building a revenue-based or profitable business is something I have advocated for many years,” said Agrawal. told CNBC Make It.

GajiGesa is in the “earned wage access” business. That means the company allows workers to withdraw their earned income instead of waiting until the end of the month to be paid. Gazi means “salary” in Indonesian and “gesa” means “hurry”.

“Vidit is a great person in that he is always pushing boundaries and always trying something new to help the whole ecosystem,” said Gazigesa client retailer Kammo Group Chief Financial Officer. Anuj Kumar Maheshwari said.

“Our HR department [GajiGesa] that’s why [a part of] Employer branding that can attract talent [with the perk] be able to withdraw [portions of their salaries] By the end of the month,” Maheshwari said.

It was a “visually crazy” scene with loan sharks circling both sides of the Semarang factory, so Agrawal founded Gazigesa in 2020 with his wife, Martina Malinowska, who leads engineering and product.

“On the one hand, they were trying to [lend] money to workers. On the other side, they were trying to collect money from workers,” said Agrawal, who held leadership positions at Uber, Stripe and Carro for almost eight years.

“This is a very disappointing experience. Workers had no choice,” Agrawal said. The average Indonesian worker earns about IDR 2.9 million ($192) a month and struggles to make a living.

Personnel manager of restaurant management PT. Inovasi Kuliner Indonesia said it received frequent “yelling” calls from loan sharks who lent money to its employees.

“After a few months of using GajiGesa, the calls stopped,” says Ria Al’amin.

Currently, the GajiGesa app has 42 different functions such as paying electricity bills, refilling prepaid cards and buying gas tickets.

GajiGesa partners with over 300 companies and serves over 750,000 employees.

Agrawal claims GajiGesa is the largest working wage access player in Indonesia. “Don’t say anything like that [myself]”When you talk to investors in the market, they talk to every player in earned wage access, but they say we’re the biggest,” he said.

“At the same time, we’ve never overhired, so we’re lucky that we didn’t have to lay off people,” Agrawal said.

The entrepreneur also shared how he runs a sustainable business.

Agrawal doesn’t believe in using incentives to keep users engaged. If the product doesn’t work, he shuts it down.

“If you have to pay $2 to earn $1, it’s not a business,” says Agrawal.

They incentivize new companies to join them, but do not continue to incentivize existing users.

The key is to balance growth and sustainability.

“I don’t mind giving up 100% annual growth or 100x growth if we can build a sustainable revenue-based business,” says Agrawal.

At the Malaysian used car market Carro, where he was chief operating officer, there was a principle called thrift balanced with quality, which he said he applies to his startup today. rice field.

“We don’t want to give up quality, but we also want to be thrifty as a company,” he said.

He was so thrifty that employees called him “cheap” in annoyance.

“I’ve never had a fancy dinner, but I’m not compromising on the fun. I’ve had events in my office where I catered. Costs were low, but I made sure people really enjoyed it.” says Agrawal.

He also negotiates a 5% discount, but the company has the money to pay for it. “Whenever I see excess fat on my bones, I try to cut it off,” he added.

“Once people join GajiGesa, why does the CEO really care about this $10 cost? If I can travel on a budget, I would love to. My team to see it.”

Despite having $9 million in the bank, they had already cut operating costs for the first two years, he said.

GajiGesa has raised a $2.5 million seed round in February 2021 and a pre-series A round of $6.6 million in November 2021. Investors include January Capital, Northstar Group, European paid wage access company Wagestream, and Next Billion Ventures.

But he emphasized that they are spending money on things that are important to their business.

“We don’t compromise on engineering. We don’t compromise on technical tools. We don’t compromise on fees for top performers,” says Agrawal.

During his time at Stripe, he learned how to take care of people. “Stripe treats you as a person, not a number,” he says.

All full-time Gaziguesa employees receive employee stock options.

“We all have to pay our bills and take care of our families. If the company does well and somehow has a good exit, the team gets real value out of it.” said Agrawal.