Paytm Lays Off 100s Of Employees After Induction Of AI To Cut Costs

Paytm's parent company One97 Communication has laid off 100s of employees across verticals including sales and engineering, due to the firm's implementation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to bring automation in its process and ensure cost-cutting.

Paytm's induction of AI in its operations meant a reduction in costs, improved efficacy of operation, and removal of repetitive tasks and roles in the fintech firms as it seeks to improve its core business of payment by increasing its manpower.

Paytm said the induction of AI will help them save at least 10 per cent in employee costs and will help them "deliver more than expected".

"We are transforming our operations with AI-powered automation to drive efficiency, eliminating repetitive tasks and roles to drive efficiency across growth and costs, resulting in a slight reduction in our workforce in operations and marketing over a period of time. We will be able to save 10-15 per cent in employee costs as AI has delivered more than we expected it to. Additionally, we constantly evaluate cases of non-performance throughout the year," Paytm said.

"Our core business of payment may see manpower increase by 15,000 more in the coming year. With a dominant position in the payments platform and a proven profitable business model, we will continue to innovate for India. In this, Insurance and Wealth will be a logical expansion of our platform, in continuation of our focus on the existing businesses. Having shown the strength of our distribution-based business model in loan distribution, we are expanding the same to focus on new businesses to drive scale," the firm said.

Vijay Shekhar Sharma, Paytm's Founder and CEO, is pushing his 10,000-strong technology, product and engineering teams to use Microsoft Corp. and Google AI tools. That has helped Paytm narrow product development to just days from weeks.

In 2021, Paytm fired 500-700 employees based on their non-performance and in December this year, the fintech firm said it aims to slow down its small-ticket loans and focus on the expansion of high-ticket personal and
merchant loans. The decision has not gone well with brokerages, prompting them to cut their revenue estimates for Paytm.

The firm plans to hire more than 15,000 contract salespeople to get more merchants on its network, aiming to hit profitability sooner than targeted.

At the same time, it's orchestrating a campaign to boost its salesforce to 50,000-plus people next fiscal year to try and sign up more merchants across smaller Indian cities and towns.

Paytm has fallen roughly 70 per cent since its $2.5 billion Initial Public Offering (IPO) and investors fret about their money.