Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma bets on young wealth to hit profit sooner

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Paytm plans to revamp its online wealth management services and hire more than 50,000 salespeople to get more merchants on its network, aiming to hit profitability sooner than targeted.
Billionaire founder-CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma is overhauling its suite of money management products to better tap growing wealth among younger users, who’re warmer to the idea of investing online. At the same time, it’s orchestrating a campaign to boost its salesforce more than 60% to try and sign up more merchants across smaller Indian cities and towns.

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The twin initiatives mark an ambitious effort to turn around Paytm, officially called One 97 Communications Ltd., once hailed as a new-economy symbol of India’s startup scene. The company has fallen roughly 70% since a $2.5 billion 2021 IPO as investors fret about persistent losses, while rivals such as Walmart Inc.’s PhonePE and regulatory curbs threaten to sap growth.
Now, Sharma says the wealth and merchants push, coupled with cost savings from AI automation, could help Paytm generate an operating profit in under a year. That would be faster than previous internal projections or analysts’ estimates, the CEO said without elaborating.

“We have learned and we will amplify our ability to serve India, its small merchants and businesses,” he told Bloomberg News in his company’s chrome-and-glass headquarters on the outskirts of New Delhi. “We should be crossing about 50 million merchant-base signed up on the