Paytm Undergoes Structural Change; Hires Senior Leaders From Google, Goldman

In preparation for the next phase of expansion, Paytm has hired several senior leaders over the past few weeks. According to a media report, the newly hired top-level employees have switched from top companies such as Google and Goldman Sachs.

Paytm, run by One97 Communications is now focusing on more monetisation opportunities. The company is building advertising and cloud offerings for Indian businesses and the plan to bring in more senior officials is expected to help in the expansion of these verticals for the next 12 months to 18 months. 

Vijay Shekhar Sharma, the founder of the company, said that the focus was more on providing financial services not only via its payments bank but also through lending, insurance, and wealth management.

“We will be adding more revenue line items that require vertical experts. That is why we are adding more of them. The theme that we are augmenting now is led by financial services. So what we are doing is we are creating president structures. These roles are now clearly defined,” he added.

In the recent past, Paytm has also witnessed several exits of senior leaders. Paytm Mall chief operating officer (COO) Amit Sinha, Paytm COO Kiran Vasireddy, senior vice-president Deepak Abbot, Vice-President Ankit Gera, and Senior Vice President Nitin Misra were the latest to leave the company. 

In order to minimise the effects of the recent exit of senior leaders, there have been internal promotions in the company as well. Madhur Deora, ex-chief financial officer (CFO) was promoted to the post of president and Vikas Garg who worked as senior vice-president (finance) became the deputy CFO of the company.  

Apart from internal promotions, Paytm hired two ex-Google executives – Praveen Sharma as senior vice-president (ad business) and Ankit Sinha as vice-president of Paytm AI Cloud.

Ex-Goldman Sachs executive Amit Nayyar has been appointed the president. His responsibility for the company will rest in strengthening Paytm’s footprint in lending, insurance, wealth management, and broking businesses.

The company also appointed Abhinav Kumar as the new vice-president of product marketing. Digital marketing strategist, Abhinav is popularly known as the ‘Trivago Guy’, given his appearance in the hotel booking startup Trivago’s video and print advertisements.

The Big Paytm Expansion 

One 97 is investing heavily on Paytm’s segments like travel, entertainment, games, etc. Recently the parent company has invested $4.5 Mn to strengthen Paytm entertainment. 

To give a boost to its travel segment, the company has even committed $35 Mn last month. The funds will help the company scale up the product. Currently, Paytm says that it sells six million travel tickets every month. 

Further, Paytm was able to raise $20 Mn from Agtech and One 97 towards Paytm’s first games. The company plans to expand its services with this investment. Paytm rebranded its gaming platform GamePind as Paytm First Game this year. The gaming platform claims to have annual revenue of $50 Mn.