Work-life balance is one of the most talked-about concerns by both professionals and entrepreneurs. e27 is no stranger to founders’ stories about how to be productive amidst major life changes or even personal crises.
In many fields, there’s also the proverbial glass ceiling to deal with – female entrepreneurs facing much bigger challenges because of societal expectations regarding having children and raising a family.
For Eynat Guez, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Israel-based startup Papaya Global, this could not be farther from the truth. She recalls an incident during which she had to deal with noisy kids while on the phone with a potential investor. “That was one of the most embarrassing calls because I had a screaming child in the background,” she shares.
That call was with Insight Partners, and although it was two years in the making, Papaya Global eventually got the deal.
In November 2019, the startup raised a US$45 million Series A led by Insight Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners, New Era Capital Partners, and Dynamic Loop Capital, as well as existing investors. During that time, the company focused closely on growth.
“We scaled, we grew, we automated, and we invested heavily in our product, technology, and offering. We tripled the size of our team, the number of clients, and our revenues year-over-year,” shares Guez.
The company has the distinction of its growth being achieved from an initially small seed round before growing into an international company with 75 employees and US$10 million in annual revenue. It now counts over 150 customers, including Microsoft and Intel, among other major users. Papaya Global now has offices in Singapore and Shanghai to address the needs of the growing APAC market.
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Commitment and dedication to the business are among the drivers of success. Between launching in 2016 and the Series A fundraising, Guez has given birth twice. She recalls returning to work shortly after childbirth.
“I came back to work two hours after I gave birth. This is my choice. This is what drives me,” she shares.
According to the Crunchbase EoY 2019 diversity report, only 20 per cent of newly-funded startups have a female founder. However, the report also stated that “many notable female-founded venture firms have been set up in the last 10 years.”
Additionally, the concept of “investor bias” is not necessarily dominant, although the opportunities might be hard to come by without the right connections. “This is an industry that has always run on relationship networks,” shares Susan Lyne, co-founder of BBG Ventures, and who established a VC that specifically invests in consumer tech startups with a female founder. “Someone you know and respect makes an introduction to a great founder and you agree to hear their pitch. But if women are not part of your network, you’re at a disadvantage — you’re going to miss a lot of great companies.”
Also Read: Women in tech: Carman Chan’s Click Ventures is one of the most consistent VC funds globally
For Guez, this rings true. Having worked in the global workforce industry for a number of years, she was introduced to Ofer Herman (who leads R&D) and Ruben Drong (who leads product development) by friends, who gave the much-needed introductions to people who eventually became co-founders.
Integration
Another factor that sets the company apart is its focus on integration. Papaya’s product integrates closely with an array of other ERP, HRIS, expense management systems, thus providing global companies a way to manage these from one single point of contact.
Having a global focus, the company ensures compliance with regional and local regulations, such as GDPR for data privacy, and local taxation requirements. The service also provides employer-on-record (EoR) capability for businesses that prefer to hire employees in other countries through local entities, rather than go through the expense of setting up a local legal entity.
Guez and co-founders conceptualised Papaya to be a global company from day one. “There is no such thing as an Israeli company,” she has shared, referring to how her startup had a global market in its sights upon launch.
The right timing
Businesses are increasingly going global, and this includes both enterprise and small-scale businesses. At least 65 per cent of small and medium businesses work with vendors and suppliers from overseas. There are nuances that these companies must deal with, including ever-changing regulations on pay, withholding tax, and benefits. Guez says that many companies around the world are still using spreadsheets to manage their global payroll — thus an opportunity to provide a disruptive global payroll and payment services to the market came about.
In the end, family matters for Guez, but she worked to ensure that the company could run itself even with her temporarily out of the picture. She says that with each of her two childbirths, she successfully delegated key decision-making capabilities: “I rebuilt the company to ensure they can all work without me.”
She highlights that motherhood has put things in perspective, “being pregnant ensures you align everything, that the company can really continue working without you, quite a lot of CEOs aren’t doing that.”
Guez concludes: “I’m a ‘people person’ and my experience has taught me that value comes from being truly motivated to help someone else succeed.”
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The post Two babies and US$45M Series A in tow: A female entrepreneur’s journey to dominating the global payroll industry appeared first on e27.